Former President Barack Obama responded to President Donald Trump and his administration's criticism of his Cheesecake Factory joke, saying he "lived" at the popular chain restaurant when his daughters were young.
"I am the father of two daughters; do you think I could have survived their childhood without the Cheesecake Factory?" Obama said at an Oct. 28 rally outside Atlanta for Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff and Democratic gubernatorial candidate Keisha Lance Bottoms. "That was my jam for about a decade."
The response comes after conservative commentators and Trump administration officials seized on the joke, made during an Oct. 24 rally in Ohio, with some characterizing Obama as elitist.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent visited a Cheesecake Factory
for lunch on Oct. 26, saying: "I had a great meal, always have a great meal, and I would tell the Martha’s Vineyard set to give it a try," referring to the Obamas, who own a home in the exclusive New England island enclave. Trump said the joke was an example of why Obama was "a lousy president" the same day.
Obama called the Republican reaction to the joke "a whole-of-government response," citing Bessent’s lunch without naming the Treasury secretary. The former president said the discourse was a distraction that showed the Trump administration is "not serious people."
"They don't have solutions to actual problems, so they'd rather have the media and you talking about the Cheesecake Factory," Obama said. "Just keep throwing distractions out there ... and hope that you won't notice your bills are higher and your life is tougher."
He noted that the Trump administration "did not dispute" several claims he made while setting up the Cheesecake Factory joke, including allegations of corruption, the effect of tariffs on consumer costs and his comparison of the White House's appearance to something built by former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.
'They made a choice to fight a war they didn't need to fight'
At the rally, Obama repeated criticisms of the Trump administration that he has made at previous campaign stops, focusing on the ongoing U.S. war with Iran and rising gas prices and living costs.
"They made a choice to fight a war they didn't need to fight. They made a choice to impose tariffs. That is why prices are going up," Obama said.
Obama has campaigned for Democrats in the closing stretch of the midterm elections, which will determine control of Congress and could limit Trump's ability to advance his presidential agenda. Ossoff leads Republican challenger Rep. Mike Collins by more than eight percentage points in the RealClearPolitics polling average.
Ossoff vowed to investigate the Trump administration in his speech introducing Obama, calling it "a spectacle of grift."
"Here’s the bottom line: if you’re involved in any of this, next year you’ll be raising your right hand and swearing to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God, in front of the United States Congress," Ossoff said.
The crowd at the Arena at Southlake in Morrow, Georgia, cheered the statement and chanted "lock him up."
In the governor’s race, Republican Rick Jackson leads Bottoms by just over one percentage point in the RealClearPolitics polling average.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Obama says Cheesecake Factory was his 'jam for about a decade'
