U.S. President Donald Trump during an arrival ceremony on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., November 18, 2025 (REUTERS)
MS NOW anchor Katy Tur and contributor Peter Baker took a stab at the mania-grade obsession President Donald Trump suffers over former President Barack Obama, as judged by Trump’s never-ending crusade to try to top the more popular president in speeches, claims and boasts.
“He's really focused and he keeps being focused on this, and he's doing it with Iran too. He's got to be better than Obama," said Tur on her show "The Moment" on Tuesday. "So he brings this up, Peter. He declares that he's going to change [things], he's going to fix it, it's going to be wonderful and he keeps going on about it. … But then he also has to try to top Obama. What is the obsession with trying to top Obama? Why can't he just let it go? The Presidency is over.”
“He's trying to top Obama, because Obama is more popular than him,” said Baker. “He had had a presidency, according to polls, that more Americans supported — then and now Obama, according to those polls, is one of the most popular figures in American life, and I think he just has always fixated on Obama. Why did he talk about the birther lie, why did he sit there and talk about how Obama supposedly wasn't born in this country? And then, of course he was. He's trying to undercut him, trying to undermine him.”
“When he is sitting at that White House Correspondent Association dinner in the audience while Obama is on stage making fun of him, he's was seething,” Baker added. “You can see from the clips, if you haven't been there yourself, you can see the television clips how he was furious at being mocked by Obama and ever since he blamed Obama for all manner of. You know things that have hurt his administration. The Russia investigation is all Obama's fault. Somehow, he's accused Obama of treason. He suggested Obama should be arrested. And yes, as you say on anything, whether it be the reflecting pool or the Iran deal, he has to say he's doing better than Obama when in fact, at the moment it doesn't look like that.”
Other critics say Trump’s fury lies in the fact that Black man continues to top him in both popularity and deed. Trump has even re-posted videos describing Trump as the "King of the Jungle" while depicting the former President and his wife as apes, a frequently used racist trope.
Trump eventually removed the post after Sen. Pete Ricketts (R-Neb.), Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) and even Mississippi Republican Sen. Roger Wicker spoke publicly against his post.
But Trump has his own massive popularity problem independent of Obama’s surpassing appeal.
“Well, Katy, the metaphors are so perfect for his adversaries,” said former George Bush and John McCain speech writer Mark McKinnon, referring to Trump’s ick-filled Reflecting Pool. “Metaphors [and the storytelling] are so important, and I'm reminded as I watch the ballroom and the reflecting pool, and just how obvious a metaphor that is for what's going on with the Trump administration, where his priorities are right now. The day that I saw the video of John Kerry windsurfing in 2004 was a perfect metaphor for John Kerry and the flip flop. And we wrote that windsurfing ad in 30 seconds because it made itself, because that perfectly illustrated John Kerry. Well, the reflecting pool and the ball room are perfect metaphors for Donald Trump and the fact that his priorities are not with the American people right now.”
“They want to outdo Obama, but the fact is that, no matter how you draw this up, it doesn't look like there's any possible route to a conclusion [to the war in Iran] in which it is any better and likely much worse than the Obama agreement that was put in place years ago.”