Former US President Barack Obama, speaking at simultaneous rallies for Republicans in Ohio and Democrats in Georgia, mocked current President Donald Trump's reaction to his joke about the state of the White House. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing The Guardian.
In Ohio, Trump responded with indignation to his predecessor Barack Obama's joke that "he's got the White House looking like Saddam Hussein opened a Cheesecake Factory." "I paid for it myself. I fixed it, and now it's more beautiful and in better shape," Trump said, defending the quality of his renovations to the White House. He added that Obama was miffed because he is someone "who doesn't understand cleanliness, who doesn't understand broken, cracked stone and sidewalk, who doesn't understand that having asphalt going to your main entrance is not the right thing."
A short time later in Georgia, Obama repeated his jibe and then reflected on the outraged response to his joke. "The guy is building a ballroom that is bigger than the White House. He's paved over the Rose Garden, put a helicopter pad on the South Lawn, and there is gold everywhere. So much gold," Obama said. "This is a fact, I'm not making this up. He, the president of the United States, is spending time super-gluing gold medallions to the mantel in the Oval Office. I am not making this up. He is literally doing arts and crafts while we are fighting a war and trying to deal with out-of-control prices."
"I heard the president was not happy when I joked over the weekend that he's got the White House looking like Saddam Hussein opened a Cheesecake Factory," the former president said. "First of all, let me get this on the record: I am the father of two daughters. Do you think, could have survived their childhood without going to the Cheesecake Factory?"
"Chucky Cheese and California Pizza Kitchen and the Cheesecake Factory – that was my jam for about a decade," Obama said.
"The interesting thing about how the administration responded to the speech I gave the other day. They did not dispute what I said about them being directly responsible for rising prices. They did not argue with that," Obama continued. "They did not deny tariffs were contributing to higher costs for families. They didn't say anything about that. I accused this administration, based on the facts, that they were engaging in unprecedented levels of corruption. They didn't say anything about that. The president wasn't even mad about the Saddam Hussein comparison. That part didn't bother him, but he was very upset about the Cheesecake Factory comments. He took great umbrage. He said, I didn't understand the work of the artisans in the White House."
"It's all crazy, but this was the really crazy part," Obama added. "They mobilized a whole of government response to that joke - not to inflation, but to that joke."
"The White House even called the secretary of the treasury – this is the man who is in charge of the economy, the person who's supposed to be figuring out how to make your life more affordable, the guy who's supposed to be figuring out how to lower inflation and reduce interest rates. They told him he should hold a press conference in front of the Cheesecake Factory," Obama said, to laughter from the crowd.
Cris Seda Chabrier contributed reporting.