What’s Obama been up to?
Post Reports
The Washington Post
4.4 • 5.1K Ratings
🗓️ 27 October 2025
⏱️ 23 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Former presidents usually leave the big political battles to their successors. Up until this year, that was largely the case for former president Barack Obama. In his retirement from politics, he founded an award-winning production company, wrote a memoir, and worked to cultivate new political leaders through the Obama Foundation.
But a second Trump presidency has tested Obama and put him back in the national spotlight as the Democratic Party looks to him for answers on how to respond to Trump’s most unprecedented policies, including partisan redistricting.
Today on “Post Reports,” host Colby Itkowitz speaks with national politics reporter Yasmeen Abutaleb about how Obama is confronting Trump and why his voice continues to hold sway over Democrats.
Today’s show was produced by Rennie Svirnovskiy, with help from Sabby Robinson. It was edited by Ariel Plotnick and mixed by Sean Carter.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | America is changing. And so is the world. |
| 0:04.4 | But what's happening in America isn't just the cause of global upheaval. |
| 0:08.6 | It's also a symptom of disruption that's happening everywhere. |
| 0:12.4 | I'm Asma Khalid in Washington, D.C. |
| 0:14.6 | I'm Tristan Redman in London, and this is the global story. |
| 0:18.8 | Every weekday will bring you a story from this intersection, where the world and America meet. |
| 0:24.4 | Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts. |
| 0:32.5 | Where is former President Barack Obama? That's the question on many Democrats' minds. |
| 0:40.7 | The country is at a crossroads, |
| 0:42.6 | and their party is clamoring for a leader. |
| 0:45.4 | Since Obama left office in 2017, |
| 0:48.0 | he's been choosy about when to get off the sidelines. |
| 0:50.9 | He's refrained from commenting on President Trump's every move. But recently, Obama has |
| 0:55.9 | found it harder to stay silent. From the newsroom of the Washington Post, this is Post |
| 1:04.3 | reports. I'm Kolby Ekowitz. It's Monday, October 27th. Today, politics reporter Yasmin Abu Talib explains why former President |
| 1:14.4 | Barack Obama has decided to speak out now and how his voice is still the most powerful in the |
| 1:20.3 | Democratic Party. |
| 1:29.3 | Yasmin, thanks so much for joining me. Thanks for having me. |
| 1:30.3 | So Yasmeen, how has President Obama engaged with politics since leaving office? |
| 1:35.3 | Like, what's his strategy? |
| 1:37.3 | It's been pretty similar to how he thought about it in Trump's first term, where his advisor |
| 1:43.3 | say his ultimate goal is to build a Democratic Party that can survive without him. |
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