bdmetronews Desk ॥ Wrapping up the final press conference of his consequential eight years in office, President Obama delivered a personal message on Wednesday to any Americans distraught over Donald Trump’s victory: “We’re going to be OK.”
“It is true that behind closed doors, I curse more than I do publicly, and sometimes I get mad and frustrated like everybody else does, but at my core, I think we’re going to be OK,” the president said. “We just have to fight for it, we have to work for it and not take it for granted.”
In the hourlong question-and-answer session, Obama also defended the news media, which Trump likes to bash, and listed the political and social issues that would lead him to speak out after he leaves the White House to his successor. He denounced stories about in-person voter fraud as “fake news,” and traced voter suppression back to the legacy of slavery. He mused that advances in gay rights on his watch won’t prove “reversible.” He suggested that Trump build a strong team, saying the presidency “is a job of such magnitude that you can’t do it by yourself.” Obama warned him to think through any sudden changes to Middle East policy, like moving the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. And the president defended his handling of the United States’ relationship with Russia and his decision to show clemency to convicted national security leaker Chelsea Manning.
Obama was not asked, and did not volunteer anything, about any misgivings or mistakes he may have made, beyond a joking reference to Michelle Obama talking him out of wearing a tan suit to the press conference (he was mocked for wearing a tan suit to an August 2014 session with reporters). There were no questions about Syria, North Korea or the Iran nuclear deal.
The final question, from a White House reporter who has known him since his days in the Illinois statehouse, was about how he explained Trump’s election to his daughters Sasha and Malia, given first lady Michelle Obama’s impassioned denunciation of Trump in a mid-October speech.
“They paid attention to what their mom said during the campaign,” he said. “But what we’ve also tried to teach them is resilience, and we’ve tried to teach them hope and that the only thing that is the end of the world is the end of the world.”
So while his daughters were “disappointed” on Nov. 8, Obama continued, they know that “You get knocked down, you get up, brush yourself off and you get back to work. And that tended to be their attitude. I think neither of them intend to pursue a future of politics, and in that, too, I think their mother’s influence shows.”
President Obama waves as he departs the briefing room at the conclusion of his final press conference at the White House in Washington, D.C. (Photo:Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)
President Obama leaves the briefing room after his final press conference at the White House. (Photo:Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)
Asked whether the country would someday again elect a black president, Obama predicted growing diversity in the Oval Office. “If, in fact, we continue to keep opportunity open to everybody, then yeah, we’re going to have a woman president. We’re going to have a Latino president. And we’ll have a Jewish president, a Hindu president. You know, who knows who we’re going to have,” he said. “I suspect we’ll have a whole bunch of mixed-up presidents at some point that nobody really knows what to call them.”
Obama did not offer much detail about his telephone conversations with Trump, but disclosed that he had urged the president-elect to take particular care in choosing his advisers.
