During a campaign appearance for presidential candidate Harris, former President Obama criticized his successor: Trump was “crazy” and talked for as long as Fidel Castro. He made an impressive appeal to black men to vote for Harris.
As he joined Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris’s campaign, former US President Barack Obama described Republican rival Donald Trump as “crazy”.
He couldn’t understand “why anyone thinks Donald Trump is going to change things,” Obama said at the rally in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He compared the Republican’s long speeches to those of Cuban leader Fidel Castro, who died in 2013.
“Do you think Donald Trump has ever changed a diaper?” he asked the crowd. Obama called Trump’s business selling Bibles just as “crazy” as the Republican presidential candidate’s turn to conspiracy narratives.
“Don’t boo – go vote!”
As the crowd booed at Trump, Obama said, “Don’t boo – go vote!” Harris is “more prepared for the task than any presidential candidate has ever been,” the Democrat continued.
At another point, he mocked an answer from the Republican presidential candidate during the television duel with Harris. When asked what his alternative was to Obama’s reformed health care and affordable health insurance, Trump replied that he only had “concepts for a plan.” “Donald Trump has spent his entire presidency trying to tear him down,” Obama said of the Affordable Care Act, which Trump is fighting. “And by the way, he didn’t even get that right.”
Obama appeals to black male voters
Obama chided black male voters who might be attracted to Trump’s macho behavior. “I’m sorry, gentlemen, I’ve noticed this, particularly among some men who seem to think that Trump’s behavior of bullying and putting people down is a sign of strength,” Obama said. “And I’m here to tell you that that’s not what true strength is.”
Even before the actual rally, Obama had made an unusually direct appeal to black men: “They come with all kinds of reasons and excuses, and I have a problem with that,” said Obama. Some of this makes him suspect, “and I’m speaking directly to the men here, (…) that you simply don’t have the stomach for having a woman as president.” The polls show Harris is having a hard time mobilizing support from black men.
The 63-year-old Obama still enjoys high respect and influence in the Democratic Party. Obama, who was elected the first black president in US history in 2008, could use his appearances to mobilize black and young voters in particular for the Democratic Party.