Former President Barack Obama said he felt a sense of “serenity” in handing the presidency over to Donald Trump, telling Britain’s Prince Harry that a “satisfying feeling” came over him during his successor’s inauguration.
Speaking in an interview for the BBC Radio 4’s Today Program aired Wednesday, the 44th U.S. president said he felt a great sense of accomplishment after leaving the White House during his departure ceremony on Jan. 20.
“The sense that there was a completion and that we had done the work in a way that preserved our integrity and left us whole, and that we hadn’t fundamentally changed I think it was a satisfying feeling,” Mr. Obama said. “Now, that was mixed with all the work that was still undone and concerns about how the country moves forward, but, you know, overall there was serenity there — more than I would have expected.
“One of the metaphors that I always used for the presidency is that you are a relay runner,” he continued. “There is the sense sometimes in any position of leadership that you, by yourself, do certain things and then it’s over and I always viewed it as taking the baton from a whole range of people who had come before me. Some of whom had been heroic; some of whom had screwed up. But wherever you were in the race: if you ran hard, if you did your best, and that you then were able to pass that baton off successfully and the country was better off, the world was a little bit better off, then when you got there, then you could take some pride in that. And I think we were able to do that.”
Elsewhere in the interview with Prince Harry, Mr. Obama took a veiled shot at President Trump about how leaders should be careful in their use of social media.
“All of us in leadership have to find ways in which we can recreate a common space on the internet,” he said. “One of the dangers of the internet is that people can have entirely different realities. They can be cocooned in information that reinforces their current biases.”
Mr. Trump is a prolific Twitter user, but Mr. Obama refrained from mentioning his successor by name.
• Jessica Chasmar can be reached at jchasmar@washingtontimes.com.
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