Trump Offers Rare Praise of Obamas Ahead of DNC Speeches

Donald Trump praised his predecessor, Barack Obama, on Tuesday ahead of the latter’s speech at the Democratic National Convention.

Speaking to CNN in Detroit, the Republican nominee said that he personally liked Obama, describing him as a “nice gentleman” but added that he felt Obama was weak on trade.

“Take a look at Japan, take a look at China, take at look at some of these countries and what they did,” Trump told CNN’s Kristen Holmes. “But I happen to like him. I respect him and I respect his wife.”

Both Barack and Michelle Obama are due to speak at the DNC in Chicago Tuesday night.

Despite a single policy-focused dig, Trump’s comments were uncharacteristically softer than his past criticisms and false claims about the man who preceded him in the White House.

Trump questioned Obama’s citizenship

In 2011, Trump joined in with others who had claimed Barack Obama had not been born in the United States and therefore could not be president.

“I want him to show his birth certificate… There’s something on that birth certificate that he doesn’t like,” Trump told The View in March 2011. A month later, with Trump beating the drum on what became known as “birtherism,” the White House released Obama’s long-form birth certificate showing he was born in Hawaii, hoping to quell the conspiracy theory.

Even still, Trump was not satisfied. More than a year later, in August 2012, he said an “extremely credible source” had told him that Obama’s birth certificate was a fraud.

Trump called Obama a ‘disaster’

As the 2016 election grew closer, Trump repeated claims he made on the campaign trail during an appearance on Fox News.

“I think he’s the worst president maybe in the history of our country,” he told the outlet, while also saying that Obama had been a “disaster”.

Trump also repeated more standard Republican criticism that Obama, then at the end of his second term, had been weak an ineffective as president.

Trump claimed Obama founded ISIS

After previously making assertions that Obama was sympathetic to Islamist extremists, Trump then claimed that the president had a hand in creating the ISIS terror network.

“ISIS is honoring President Obama. He’s the founder of ISIS. He’s the founder of ISIS. He’s the founder. He founded ISIS,” Trump told a rally in August 2016.

Trump claimed Obama was running Biden’s White House

In late 2023, Trump joined other conservatives in claiming Obama was the one running the country, not President Biden.

“Obama has plenty to deal with. I call him, I call him Biden’s boss,” Trump said at a campaign event in October 2023.

The line appeared to come from a 2020 clip of Obama on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, in which he joked that in an ideal world he would have a stand-in with an earpiece, so he could feed them lines.

After meeting Obama, Trump did praise him

After Trump shocked the country and won the 2016 election, he made the customary visit to the White House to meet Obama, where the outgoing president and president-elect had an icy photo-op and handshake.

“I’m getting along very well with him… other than a couple of statements (that) I responded to and we talked about it and smiled about it,” Trump said that December.

Obama then left Trump a letter in the Oval Office to find following his inauguration, which Trump said he would “cherish”.

Follow Newsweek‘s live DNC updates here.