Taking a page out of Laura Bush’s playbook when it came time to step down from her position, former first lady Michelle Obama says reached out to Melania Trump to offer advice on the years ahead. But the current FLOTUS reportedly ghosted her.
During a sit-down interview with ABC anchor Robin Roberts on Sunday, Obama was asked, “Has (Trump) reached out?”
“No,” said Obama. “No, she hasn’t.”
Trump’s communications director, Stephanie Grisham, confirmed the lack of correspondence in a statement to CNN on Monday.
“Mrs. Trump is a strong and independent woman who has been navigating her role as First Lady in her own way,” the statement said. “When she needs advice on any issue, she seeks it from her professional team within the White House.”
Obama — who was on ABC promoting her new memoir, “Becoming” — has met with Trump at least once since the election. But when asked about the current occupants of the White House, the former FLOTUS chose to answer in a dignified manner.
“One of the things you learn as a former, it’s, like, I don’t judge what a current is doing, you know?” Obama said. “So I’d prefer not to, you know, speak on what she’s doing versus what I did because I think every first lady approaches this job differently.”
But as many know and will further learn from Obama’s book, it’s still clear how she feels about the Trump administration. In “Becoming,” portions of which she read during the ABC interview, Michelle Obama wrote about Inauguration Day in 2017.
“The vibrant diversity of the two previous inaugurations was gone… Someone from Barack’s administration might have said that the optics there were bad — that what the public saw didn’t reflect the president’s reality or ideals,” Obama wrote. “But in this case, maybe it did. Realizing it, I made my own optic adjustment: I stopped even trying to smile.”
If you’re interested in learning more about the former First Lady and her journey, make sure to get a copy of Michelle Obama’s new book “Becoming,” which officially releases today.
