ATLANTA — Former first lady Michelle Obama, once the best-polling Democrat against former President Donald Trump, has no ambition to be a politician, but some Georgia residents want more of her in the Democratic Party and politics.
Obama appealed to and pleaded with the several thousand mostly Generation Z attendees at a get-out-the-vote event in south Atlanta on Tuesday evening to make a plan to cast their ballots before early voting ends on Friday or to vote in person next Tuesday.
“When you break 12,000 people down across precincts, that’s just four votes per precinct,” Obama said, referring to the fewer than 12,000 votes that tipped the scale in Georgia for President Joe Biden in 2020.
But for voters on-site, Obama was the appeal of the event because she and her husband, former President Barack Obama, have become the faces of the Democratic Party in Georgia.
Dr. Trudi Williams, an author and retired educator in the crowd on Tuesday, said the Obamas would not only remain relevant after leaving office in 2017 but are also seen as the leaders of the party.
“The Obamas are the face of the Democratic Party. They always will be because former President Obama, as well as first lady Michelle Obama, made a great impact on the Democratic Party, and the Democratic Party sort of shifted once they became president,” Williams said.
Houston Smith, a sophomore at Spelman College, a historically black, women’s liberal arts school in Atlanta, viewed the Obamas as “the face of the black Democratic Party.”
Williams said she wished Michelle Obama had run for president this time around, though the former first lady has repeatedly expressed no interest in the job.
“I am not a politician and will never be. Ever, ever,” Michelle Obama said on Tuesday.
Despite her disinterest, voters are interested in her future as a politician. Michelle Obama outperformed President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and other well-known Democratic politicians when pit against Trump in a national poll conducted over the summer.
“She just has so much to offer to society and to the young women,” said Williams, who added that she was pleased with Harris as the nominee.
Gabrielle Pecke, a sophomore at Spelman College studying economics and food studies, said she would have “100%” supported Michelle Obama if she had run for president this cycle.
“I understand why she didn’t because she constantly said she doesn’t want to. She knows where she’s working best at, and if you don’t have a passion for it, then you won’t do well at it,” said Pecke, who attended the rally with a friend. “If she ran, I would definitely 100% be behind her. So, of course, I would always love to stand behind a black woman running for president.”
Michelle Obama’s frankness is part of her appeal to voters. Over the past week, she has increasingly been outspoken in public attacks on Trump.
“I hope that you’ll forgive me if I’m a little angry that we are indifferent to his erratic behavior, his obvious mental decline, his history as a convicted felon … a known slumlord, a predator found liable for sexual abuse, all of this, while we pick apart Kamala’s answers from interviews that he doesn’t even have the courage to do, y’all,” Michelle Obama said on Saturday while campaigning with Harris in Michigan.
Michelle Obama’s role in leading When We All Vote since 2018 and her decision not to pursue politics have freed her up to be able to speak frankly in this election, according to Smith, a comparative women’s studies major.
“When you don’t have the stress of millions and millions of Americans, millions and millions of Americans watching your every move, I think that it kind of takes off some of the weight, and you get to be your true self and who you really are,” Smith said.
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The infighting between Michelle Obama and Trump was to be expected, according to Smith.
“Donald Trump is a misogynist at his core. I think that he is also a racist, so it’s very on par for him and his supporters to hate on Michelle Obama,” Smith said. “This is what it looks like to be a black woman in politics.”
