‘It’s just not for me…’
(Ben Sellers, Liberty Headlines) While speculation continued to mount that Michelle Obama may be planning a behind-the-scenes bid to commandeer the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, the former first lady issued an unequivocal denial.
“Just between us, and the readers of this magazine—there’s zero chance,” Obama told 12-year-old journalist Hilde Lysiak for Amtrack’s magazine The National.
“There are so many ways to improve this country and build a better world, and I keep doing plenty of them … But sitting behind the desk in the Oval Office will never be one of them,” she said. “It’s just not for me.”
The latest denial came after left-wing provocateur Michael Moore began making the rounds on talk shows, including “Late Night with Seth Meyers” and a recent MSNBC panel, where he actively called for Mrs. Obama to enter the race.
“We’re going to run a beloved candidate who is a streetfighter,” Moore obliquely told Meyers last week. “I’m serious—folks, if we put up the wrong horse in this race, we’re doomed again. Let’s not do that.”
He later went on to clarify for Brian Williams that the candidate he had in mind had a name that rhymed with “Obama.”
“In fact, it is Obama. Michelle Obama,” he said. “Everybody watching this right now knows she is a beloved American and she would go in there and she would beat him.”
The comments prompted well-trafficked conservative site The Drudge Report to openly speculate on the possibility, which others—including radio personalities Rush Limbaugh and Mike Huckabee already had begun to allude to.
In April, Liberty Headlines reported on several red-flag indicators that Obama might be setting the stage for a late entrance into the race.
Among the signals was the recent appointment of her ex-chief of staff, Tina Tchen, to oversee the restructuring of the Southern Poverty Law Center, which has half a billion dollars in assets that could potentially be converted from nonprofit to super-PAC status.
In addition, former President Barack Obama announced that he was folding his former campaign arm, Organizing for Action, into the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, a group targeting red states for court-forced gerrymandering that is overseen by Obama ‘wingman’ and former Attorney General Eric Holder.
Although super-PACs are not technically able to coordinate with a campaign, having two loyal devotees at the helm would ensure that campaign finance rules might be blurred just enough to skirt FEC and IRS regulations.
A deal inked last year with Netflix might further fit into the equation. The total figure of the multi-year deal, though undisclosed, is believed to have netted the couple hundreds of millions in added wealth that they could potentially use to self-finance and avoid the early fundraising free-for-all.
The position also gives the Obamas unfettered access to a widely used media platform that they could, again, use to duck campaign restrictions for political advertising while pushing their message—even if they were to later recuse themselves from the company.
One of the biggest indicators, though, of Obama’s potential aspirations, would be the pair’s notable silence on the current Democratic horse-race, which has seen many of the candidates veer to the extreme Left.
By contrast, Michelle Obama has carefully curated her own public persona to appear as a voice of moderation and motherliness, shedding the image of anger and resentment that drew backlash during her husband’s runs by rushing to condemn the calls for violence conveniently voiced by Holder and others.
At least two recent surveys have named her the ‘most admired’ woman in the world.
Obama’s past comments, while demurely discounting any interest in a run, had left the door open that she might heed the populist call if an organic “Draft Michelle” groundswell were to spontaneously spring from within Democratic ranks.
The best chance of something like that happening would be the onset of some sort of precipitating event—like, say, a massive race riot in the Obamas’ hometown of Chicago.
Even so, conservative voices like Breitbart doubted that Obama could effectively unify the Left any more than the current field of prospects—particularly if she were to lose the element of surprise.
During the last round of debates, several of the 2020 hopefuls began attacking the Barack Obama presidency as a means to criticize his vice president, current front-runner Joe Biden.
“Michelle Obama is charismatic. But she is not a moderate, and could not stop the party’s stampede to socialism if she tried,” opined Breitbart editor Joel Pollack.
“… Socialism is on the ballot; Democrats want it on the ballot,” he continued. “They will win, if the country hates Trump enough. If not, Michelle Obama can wait.”