Obama talks to Oprah about President Trump and presidential standards

Former U.S. President Barack Obama sits down with talk show host Oprah Winfrey to discuss President Donald Trump, presidential standards, his experience in the White House, and more.

Video Transcript

[MUSIC PLAYING]

BARACK OBAMA: I think every president has been held to a different standard relative to this president. I think Donald Trump breached so many norms, so many basic assumptions about what a president should or should not do that you can't come up with a comparable set of behaviors in the past. I think Michelle and I joke about the fact that one of the bigger scandals of my presidency was me wearing a tan suit during a press conference. So I had to go back and take a look at the clips about the way folks, some pundits were talking about this tan suit. And it gives you some sense that folks were paying attention to what Michelle and I were doing-- because it wasn't just me, it was our family-- in ways that were unusual, but in some ways, not unexpected.

And truthfully, Michelle and I, we felt that we should have higher standards in terms of how we behave and ethics and fidelity to the truth. And part of that was because of a reverence for the office and the space we were occupying, the people's house, the White House, the enormous responsibilities that we had. Part of it, undoubtedly, because we were firsts and felt very much the need to exceed expectations rather than just meet them, because we understood that, in the same way that any first, whether it's a Jackie Robinson or its a female CEO or know in any of those positions, you know that because you don't look like the past, people are going to be scrutinizing things a little bit more carefully.

[MUSIC PLAYING]