What you need to know
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President Barack Obama says attacks on former President Donald Trump, including his family, are crossing the line
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“This is a passage that I hope will interest people, even those whose politics I wholeheartedly reject,” Obama said. new yorker In an interview published on Monday, May 4th.
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In February, President Trump posted an AI-generated video depicting the Obamas as monkeys, but it has since been deleted.
Former President Barack Obama said he doesn’t take Donald Trump’s insults “personally,” but said he would cross a line if the president involved his wife, Michelle Obama, or other family members.
Barack’s comments in the interview new yorker The article, published on Monday, May 4, comes nearly three months after President Trump released an AI-generated video on social media depicting the Obamas as monkeys. The video, which was later deleted by President Trump, was widely criticized for perpetuating centuries-old racist tropes.
The video, which President Trump shared on Truth Social on February 5, repeats conspiracy theories about voting machines in the 2020 election, then cuts to a clip of the Obamas’ heads edited into monkey bodies while dancing to the song “The Lion Sleeps Tonight.”
“I don’t take it personally,” Barak said. new yorker. “I mean, I always get mad when my wife and kids get dragged into things, because it’s not like they chose this. This is a line that I expect them to care about, even people who wholeheartedly reject politics. I would never talk about someone’s family like that.”
The former president said he was more concerned about AI-generated videos posted by Trump and the White House that showed them treating war “like a video game” and “dumping human waste on civilians.”
He first mentioned President Trump and Michelle’s video in late February in an interview with progressive podcast host Brian Tyler Cohen.
“It’s important to recognize that the vast majority of Americans find this behavior deeply problematic,” President Obama said. “It’s true that it draws attention and it’s a distraction, but as I travel around the country, just as you travel around the country, I meet people who still believe in civility, civility and kindness.”
“There’s this kind of clown show going on on social media and on TV. And the truth is, there doesn’t seem to be any shame in this among people who used to feel like they had to have some kind of decorum and civility and respect for the office. So that’s been lost,” he added.
Asked if he would apologize for the video on Air Force One in early February, President Trump said he would not and told reporters that releasing the video was not a “mistake.”
“I saw the beginning of it, and it was okay,” he said, adding, “Nobody knew that was going to happen at the end. If they had seen it, they probably would have had the sense to tear it down.”
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Earlier in the day, White House press secretary Caroline Levitt defended Trump’s post, calling criticism of the video from some Republicans a “false outrage.” After the post was deleted, a White House official told PEOPLE that an anonymous staffer “accidentally” uploaded the post to the president’s account.
In late February, President Trump shared a social media post from far-right activist Laura Loomer that claimed Michelle Obama was an “anti-white racist.” Loomer’s post criticized a possible merger between Warner Bros. and Netflix, with which the Obamas’ production company Higher Ground Productions has been partnered for eight years.
President Trump shared a screenshot of Loomer’s post on Truth Social, similarly calling her a “racist” and “psychotic” and calling on Netflix to remove Susan Rice, a black former ambassador to the United Nations, from its board of directors.
Read the original article on People
