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Former First Lady Michelle Obama appeared on the Ellen DeGeneres Show recently to promote her new memoir Becoming. But it was her story from 2016 that made for great television. Obama recalled the night the U.S. Supreme Court legalised gay marriage across the United States – and she and her daughter Malia’s attempt to run out of the White House and onto the street to celebrate with citizens.
“When you’re in the residence, there’s so much bulletproof glass that sometimes you don’t hear what’s going on outside,” Obama said. “We didn’t realise at that time that thousands of people were gathering in front of the White House to celebrate [the legalisation of gay marriage].”
Obama says she wanted to be part of the moment outside but needed some “partners” to break out of the residence and to celebrate with. Her husband, the President, looked at her and said, ‘You know I can’t walk outside, get out of my office.” She turned to her two teenage daughters and Malia agreed to go with her mother. “We realised it wasn’t that easy to get out of the White House when you’re in it,” Obama said.
What ensued was a hilarious runaway attempt from security agents led by Obama. “You could see the agents going, ‘Why are they running?’,” she recounts. “They are calling more people, ‘She’s trying to get out, she’s trying to get out’.” The written word just doesn’t do this story justice, we’ll let Obama tell it here, as told to DeGeneres.
Obama’s husband, Barack, just made a surprise visit at one of his wife’s book tour stops in Washington, comparing his cameo to a Jay-Z and Beyoncé concert. “This is like – you know when Jay-Z comes out during the Beyoncé concert? … Like, Crazy in Love?” he said, referring to instances when the rapper appears at his wife’s concerts during performances of her hit track. “It’s the same thing. It’s just a little sample to enhance the concert.”
Obama said she and Barack hadn’t had a chance to reflect on what they accomplished while they were in the White House until very recently.“We haven’t had much time to reflect over these eight years because we were so busy doing and so busy trying to be perfect, and to get everything right that rarely did we have time to sit back and acknowledge what we’ve done,” she said before turning to her husband. “And I was able to do that with my husband just the other night. And just look at him and say, ‘man, man you did this. You did this. You did one of the hardest jobs on the planet.’”
Michelle Obama’s memoir Becoming has already hit record sales figures in the United States. You can purchase it here in Australia.
