Former first lady Michelle Obama praised former first daughters Jenna and Barbara Bush and Chelsea Clinton on Monday for their support of her daughters, Sasha and Malia.
While on a press tour for her memoir Becoming, Obama told ABC’s “Good Morning America” that she’s “so proud” of her children and immensely thankful for the daughters of former Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton.
“I am so proud of those little girls,” Michelle Obama said of her children with former President Barack Obama. “They have managed this situation with poise and grace, and they are normal and kind and smart and friendly and open. Gosh, and it could’ve gone so wrong.”
She added, “But I will also say that they had support from a lot of the other former first kids ― Jenna and Barbara and Chelsea. I love those girls. I will love them forever for what kind of support they provided to my daughters. They always had their back.”
Michelle Obama pointed out that when somebody went after Sasha or Malia in the press that Jenna Bush Hager would “say something” and Chelsea Clinton would “send a tweet out.”
“That made a big, big difference,” Obama said of the women’s actions.
Just after the inauguration of President Donald Trump, the Bush sisters penned a letter published by Time providing advice for the girls as they left the White House and entered civilian life.
“We saw both the light and wariness in your eyes as you gazed at your new home,” the Bushes wrote. “When you slid down the banister of the solarium, just as we had done as 8-year-olds and again as 20-year-olds chasing our youth, your joy and laughter were contagious.”
Later that year, Clinton and Trump’s eldest daughter, Ivanka Trump, came to the defense of Malia in 2017 after she was caught smoking marijuana.
“Malia Obama’s private life, as a young woman, a college student, a private citizen, should not be your clickbait,” read a tweet from Clinton. “Be better.”
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