Obama on Trump ‘obsession’: ‘I obviously have a … suite in his head’

Former President Obama on Wednesday said he thinks President Trump has an “obsession” with him, existing in a “suite in his head.”

“All the Smoke” podcast co-host and former NBA player Matt Barnes spoke with Obama about Trump being “very fascinated with you and your family,” but did not name the 47th president. He praised Obama for meeting Trump’s “negativity and racism with class” before he asked if Obama ever wants to “cuss his a– out sometimes?”

“The thing about it is –– look, you’ve got to ask him what it is ––” Obama said before Barnes added, “The obsession.”

“The obsession,” Obama repeated. “I obviously have a room in his head, a suite in his head.”

The former president later added that during his presidency, thinking about former President George W. Bush was “the last thing I had time to… worry about.”

“They’re gone,” the former president continued, referring to his predecessors. “I’ve got work to do. The idea that I’d be worrying about somebody who came before and me trying to measure like, ‘what’s he done today?’ Constantly worrying about that is a strange thing to me. It shows me somebody who is not focused on the American people and the job they’re supposed to do.”

Obama later added that Trump is a different person when they are alone together compared to when Trump faces the public.

“The other thing I believe in, and part of what we try to teach in our leadership training, is I believe in face-to-face,” he said. “I believe in conversation. So if this — whoever you were talking about — was in front of me, which has happened a couple times, he don’t talk like that because he knows better. And I think there is a — that filter of the phone creates a situation both where people just say kind of crazy stuff that they would never say to your face with no consequences.”

The two presidents have appeared cordial with each other when in public. The two sat together and talked to each other during former President Carter’s funeral days before Trump’s second inauguration last year.

Trump has mentioned his predecessor more often in recent months when denouncing the Obama administration’s deal to curtail Iran’s nuclear program, which Trump withdrew from in 2018. On Saturday, he accused Obama of being a “weak and ineffective leader” who empowered Iran’s leaders through what Trump described as financial concessions.

Obama said the U.S. may be “worse off” because of the Iran war.

It is widely believed that Obama’s jabs at Trump during the 2011 White House Correspondents’ Association dinner sowed tensions between the two men and helped propel Trump toward his 2016 presidential campaign.

Obama compared Trump’s birther conspiracy to other conspiracy theories like the 1969 moon landing and the whereabouts of slain rappers Biggie Smalls and Tupac Shakur. Video taken at the event shows a stone-faced Trump sat among reporters, editors and other guests.

Obama on Trump ‘obsession’: ‘I obviously have a … suite in his head’

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