Barack Obama was spotted shedding a tear as he addressed senior White House staff in the wake of Donald Trump’s shock election victory, according to a new interview archive that has laid bare the inner workings of his administration.
Those close to Obama reveal he was surprisingly emotionally stable when Trump was declared president. But he did shed some tears when the moment came to a head.
‘He came to speak to the senior staff,’ recalled Christy Goldfuss, the managing director of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. ‘He got up to give a speech and he started crying and he thanked everybody and he thanks all of us for believing in him.’
Jen Psaki, who served as Obama’s communications director, recalled that heavyweights like Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew and National Security Adviser Susan Rice were even overcome with emotion.
‘All these people who are so tough and smart and complete badasses… were tearing up,’ Psaki recalled.
But the tear-stained faces in the West Wing were a world away from the mocking laughter and derision that had filled a Washington ballroom just five years earlier.
It was the high-society event of the 2011 White House Correspondents’ Dinner, a night remembered for its glitz and sharp-tongued barbs.
David Axelrod, the veteran strategist behind Barack Obama‘s historic ascent, was weaving through the sea of tuxedos and evening gowns when he caught the unmistakable voice of Donald Trump, bragging to other attendees.
In a massive undertaking that reveals eight years in the West Wing, a colossal new archive has laid bare the inner workings of the Obama administration. One thing was made abundantly clear: Obama and his team never anticipated a Trump presidency
Obama and his first lady greet Trump and his wife Melania for tea before the inauguration at the White House in 2017
‘I know it’s crazy,’ Trump was heard crowing, ‘but I’m in front of the polls.’
The real estate tycoon, years away from his own White House run, was already holding court and relishing his status as a disruptor.
As Axelrod passed by, he overheard the future president boasting to a circle of guests about his burgeoning popularity with the electorate.
‘I kind of chuckled at it and went to my seat,’ Axelrod said. ‘I don’t think any of us really anticipated that Donald Trump would be a serious candidate for president, much less president.’
During the comedy portion of the evening, Obama even mocked Trump at the party.
Now, the curtain has been raised – revealing the build up to President Trump taking office.
In a massive undertaking that reveals eight years in the West Wing, a new trove of interviews pulls back the curtain on details from the Obama administration.
This oral history, the most significant collection of its kind ever released, was spearheaded by Columbia University’s Incite Institute in a high-profile partnership with the Obama Foundation.
While the project is being hailed as a definitive record, there are three gaping holes in the lineup: Barack Obama, former First Lady Michelle Obama, and then-Vice President Joe Biden are all absent from the interviews
Researchers spent years capturing a staggering 1,100 hours of raw audio and video footage, creating a mountain of evidence that chronicles the highs and lows of the 44th President’s tenure.
One thing was made abundantly clear: Obama and his team never anticipated a Trump presidency.
While the project is being hailed as a definitive record, there are three gaping holes in the lineup: Obama, former First Lady Michelle Obama, and then-Vice President Joe Biden are all absent from the interviews.
However, the archive more than makes up for their silence with a star-studded and politically charged roster of participants.
From heavyweight diplomats to Hollywood royalty and even fierce Republican rivals, the collection offers a ‘who’s who’ of the era’s most influential figures.
‘The outcome of the election was a direct rebuke of everything that we had been trying to do for the last 10 years,’ Josh Earnest explained, who was Mr. Obama’s last White House press secretary.
‘Trump’s candidacy,’ he added, ‘the essence of his being and everything that he stood for and everything about the way that he carried himself and everything that he championed and his rhetoric, his campaign tactics — all were anathema to everything that the Obama campaign and the Obama era, the Obama administration, had been about.’
In a series of surreal exchanges revealed by former chief strategist David Axelrod, the future president first reached out in 2010 during the catastrophic BP oil spill.
This oral history, the most significant collection of its kind ever released, was spearheaded by Columbia University’s Incite Institute in a high-profile partnership with the Obama Foundation
Using Morning Joe host Mika Brzezinski as a high-society middleman, the real estate mogul reached out to Axelrod to offer his personal services to plug the leaking Gulf of Mexico well.
Axelrod, baffled by the offer, says he declined.
Once the oil spill was contained, Trump returned with a new obsession: the ’embarrassing’ state of White House entertaining. In a phone call, Trump reportedly pitched Axelrod on preparing a custom-built Trump ballroom.
He fired off his campaign four years later, in June 2015.
‘Nobody took it seriously at the time,’ said Cody Keenan, another speechwriter for Mr. Obama.
But then, he won.
