Former President Donald Trump shared a rare moment of praise for his predecessor on Tuesday before former President Barack Obama took the stage in Chicago at the Democratic National Convention.
The comments from Trump came while he was speaking with CNN’s Kristen Holmes and asked about a possible “prebuttal” of Obama’s remarks in Illinois. It was then, before he took his stage in Michigan for a rally, that Trump offered his respect for Obama.
Still, he did hit on what he thought the former president could have done better while in office.
“I like him. I think he’s a nice gentleman, but he was very, very weak on trade,” Trump said on Tuesday. “If you take a look at what happened to our country, trade-wise, it was a disaster. Take a look at Japan. Take a look at China. Take a look at what happened with some of these countries, what they did.”
However, Trump went back to his praise for Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama.
“But I happen to like him. I respect him, and I respect his wife,” Trump said.
The remarks from Trump were not his usual ones when it comes to the Obamas, as he often throws insults at the former president and questions whether or not he was born in the United States.
During the former first couple’s speeches at the DNC, Michelle Obama ripped into the Republican nominee over some of his recent comments, including a reference to when he remarked about “Black jobs.”
“By the way — Who’s going to tell him that the job he’s currently seeking might just be one of those ‘Black jobs?’” the former first lady said.
The former president took the same approach as his wife, saying that Trump “hasn’t stopped whining about his problems” since he came down his “golden escalator.” He also said that Trump is “afraid of losing to Kamala” and that he has a “weird obsession with crowd sizes.”
“The other day, I heard someone compare Trump to the neighbor who keeps running his leaf blower outside your window every minute of every day,” Obama said. “Now, from a neighbor, that’s exhausting. From a president, that’s just dangerous.”