When Donald Trump won the presidential election in 2016, then-President Barack Obama graciously hosted him in the Oval Office, following a tradition of setting aside partisan differences for the greater good of the country.
Though it was only eight years ago, that moment seems like a different era entirely.
Earlier this week, Trump posted on social media an AI-generated video based on footage of that meeting that showed the former president being forcibly detained by the FBI and then pacing inside a jail cell.
Trump has once again shown his lack of class and decorum by his depraved use of footage of that meeting.
Trump has once again shown his lack of class and decorum by his depraved use of footage of that meeting to make an autocratic threat to distract the country from questions about his past associations with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
But Trump has plenty of presidential targets to attack. He lost to Joe Biden and he feuded with George W. Bush. He’s even raised questions about Bill Clinton’s past relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.
So why Obama? I think we all know the answer.
The AI-generated video was a projection of everything Trump fears and envies about his predecessor: Obama’s grace, intellect, global stature and, most of all, the fact that Obama’s very presence in the White House redefined what power could look like in America.
It’s clear that Obama has been living in Trump’s head rent-free for the last two decades. Some think he first ran for president because Obama made fun of him at the White House Correspondents Association dinner. He mistakenly called Biden by Obama’s name multiple times while campaigning, once even saying he beat Obama in 2016. He’s even claimed he is healthier than Obama.
Obama wins the Nobel Peace Prize? Trump spends years obsessing about winning it himself. Obama passes a historic health care law? Trump makes it his top priority to overturn it.
Trump is convicted on 34 felony counts by a jury of his peers? He posts a deepfake of Obama being arrested.
From global popularity and eloquence to the respect he commands from world leaders and celebrities, Obama is a lasting reminder of everything Trump wishes he could be.
The video is gross, but it also suggests that Trump is worried the walls may be closing in. Facing a debacle over the Epstein files, Trump is throwing red meat at his base, falsely claiming that Obama may have falsified the records, even though they date back to 2019, long after he left office.
Trump’s political career was born out of Obama hatred.
Trump’s political career was born out of Obama hatred. It was birtherism that gave him his base, the lie that Obama was foreign, un-American and undeserving of the presidency. Now, with the Epstein scandal escalating, Trump is reaching for the same playbook: distort, distract and racialize.
In a sense, the Trump era has just been one long backlash to Obama.
There is a serious undertone, however.
Trump isn’t just sharing a meme. He’s pulling from the authoritarian playbook by normalizing — and even celebrating — the concept of a president imprisoning his predecessor; especially if that predecessor is Barack Obama. Retribution is vindication; and vindication is at the heart of Trump’s dangerous Obama obsession.
For more thought-provoking insights from Michael Steele, Alicia Menendez and Symone Sanders-Townsend, watch “The Weeknight” every Monday-Friday at 7 p.m. ET on MSNBC.
