A historian dissects President Trump’s strange Obama complex

Journalists were astonished when President Donald Trump took verbal shots at President Obama (without naming him) in a speech intended to deescalate a conflict with Iran on January 8, 2020. In that kind of international crisis, U.S. presidents ordinarily encourage a united American front. Yet Trump’s remarks had a disuniting effect. He presented a sharply negative judgment about Obama’s leadership. Trump criticized Obama’s “very defective” and “foolish Iran nuclear deal.” He claimed missiles fired by Iran at bases housing U.S. troops were financed “with funds made available by the last administration.” The statement implied that blood would be on Obama’s hands if Americans died in the bombings. Journalists said it was quite unusual for a president to lash out at his predecessor when delivering an important foreign policy message that needed broad public support.

The journalists should not have been surprised. Trump has publicly berated Barack Obama on numerous occasions. While Trump’s dislike of Obama is complex and multifaceted, his behavior at the 2011 White House Correspondents’ Dinner may reveal an important source of the hostility.

At the time of that event Donald Trump maintained that Barack Obama had not been born in the United States and therefore was ineligible to be president of the United States. When President Obama stepped up to deliver a humorous monologue at the April 11 dinner, he saw an opportunity to poke fun at the champion of this false claim. Referring to rumors that Donald Trump might run for president someday, Obama pointed to Trump’s limited leadership experience as TV host of Celebrity Apprentice. Then Obama referred to recently published documentation confirming his U.S. birth. Now that the birther claim was put to rest, Obama teased, Trump could focus on “issues that matter — like, did we fake the moon landing?” Comedian Seth Meyers piled on. “Donald Trump has been saying he will run for president as a Republican,” noted Meyers, “which is surprising, since I just assumed he was running as a joke.” Continue reading.