NBC Boston, August 2020
For the past three-and-a-half years, former President Barack Obama has had little to say about the Trump presidency — until now. “Donald Trump hasn’t grown into the job because he can’t. And the consequences of that failure are severe,” Obama said in his speech to the Democratic National Convention Wednesday.
It was a sharp rebuke of the current president, describing Trump as a corrupt and divisive leader who threatens American democracy. “He has shown no interest in putting in the work… no interest in treating the presidency as anything but one more reality show that he can use to get the attention he craves.”
Northeastern University professor Costas Panagopoulos said it was clear Obama was trying to articulate a sense of urgency. Obama has been holding onto his political capital, Panagopoulos said, “because he was waiting for the right moment. And I think that he believes that this is the moment that he has to sound an alarm about the state of our democracy and to call people to action to take this seriously.”
