Former President Barack Obama revealed that he faced inappropriate behavior from some women after becoming commander in chief, but he remained unfazed by the attention from female admirers.
Channing Crowder, a former Miami Dolphins linebacker and co-host of “The Pivot,” told Obama during a recent podcast episode, “When I got drafted in the NFL, I got a little cuter.”
Obama was then asked about women making a pass at him when he was in the White House. He said there are pictures on the internet of “women grabbing my butt.”
“There are times where women have acted in somewhat inappropriate ways,” Obama said, adding that he “was not trippin’” on any attention from female admirers.
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“My wife is such an extraordinary woman, such an amazing partner, that you just try to stay focused, stay on the straight and narrow,” Obama said of former first lady Michelle Obama.
Obama pointed to many athletes attaining fame in their careers at an early age, contrasting it with his own later rise to prominence in politics. “Y’all get famous young, at a time when the attention that you’re talking about may be flattering, fun,” the former president said.
“By the time people really knew who I was, I was 43 years old. I was married, had two kids, had gone grocery shopping, had washed my car. I was a regular guy in that sense,” Obama explained.
Obama has been making several appearances at rallies and on podcasts before Election Day, campaigning for Vice President Kamala Harris to convince Black voters that she would serve in their best interest.
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He sat down with the former NFL stars to engage in a lengthy conversation, discussing several topics, including criticism of former President Trump.
Obama pointed to a variety of reasons why he’s thrown his support behind Harris, saying she believes in “treating everyone with respect” and “believes that the criminal justice system should treat everyone the same and that we should try to eliminate bias” from the system.
Harris has proved that she supports Obamacare, Obama added. “Donald Trump, he’s got the opposite orientation,” he said. “And this is somebody who has a history of looking down and disparaging people who are not like him.”
Obama told the podcast hosts that his daughters, Malia and Sasha, are determined not to use their famous family name as a way to get ahead in their careers.
“[Malia’s] first film went to Sundance and all these fancy film festivals, and she didn’t use Obama as director,” he said. “In the credits, it said Malia Ann. She used her middle name and didn’t put Obama on there.”
“The challenge for us is letting us give them any help at all. I mean, they, they’re very sensitive about this stuff. They’re very stubborn about it,” Obama said, adding that he’s inquired with Malia about her decision to use just her first and middle name for her film.
He also shared a conversation he had with Malia regarding her choice not to use her famous last name. “I was all like, ‘You do know they’ll know who you are.’ And she’s all like, ‘You know what, I want them to watch it that first time and not in any way have that association. So I think our daughters go out of their way to not try to leverage that,” Obama explained.
Fortunately, when he served his two terms as president, members of the media didn’t bother his daughters after he’d asked them not to, Obama said. However, they now face “paparazzi” at times since leaving the White House.
“I basically made a deal with the press pool, the White House press Corp, and I said, ‘You can follow me around, you can talk about me, you do whatever you need to do, leave my children alone because they have the right to grow up,” Obama said.
“They didn’t choose this. Let them grow up,” Obama said. “And to the credit of the press, they did leave them alone. Now as they’ve gotten older there’s been some paparazzi stuff going on, and it drives them nuts because their attitude is we’re not looking for all that. So they’re grounded.”
Meanwhile, Obama talked about the Obama Foundation, a Chicago-based nonprofit organization, where he said they “coach” the next generation of leaders.
“Our mission is to coach and develop the next generation of leaders, you know, who’s the Barack Obama out there or the Michelle Obama out there, right now,” he said. “Not just here in the United States, but in other parts of the world who are doing amazing things on health care or education.”
