Obama Slams Founding Fathers at Presidential Center Debut: They ‘Fell Terribly Short’
“In forming our union, the founders fell terribly short of the Declaration’s promise, leaving slavery intact, allowing states to restrict the franchise to white men who owned property.”
Rather than celebrating the extraordinary bravery and immense personal sacrifice of America’s founding fathers, former President Barack Obama used the debut of his presidential center on Thursday to emphasize their failures, telling attendees that the nation’s founders “fell terribly short” of the ideals they espoused.
He said:
The success of this experiment was never a given. In forming our union, the founders fell terribly short of the Declaration’s promise, leaving slavery intact, allowing states to restrict the franchise to white men who owned property. But in drafting a Constitution and a Bill of Rights, they did have the foresight, the genius, to provide us with a framework that allows each generation to make our union more perfect.
He knows very well why abolition was not included in the Declaration of Independence. The founders’ “failure” to abolish slavery at the nation’s birth was not the result of indifference to the contradiction between liberty and human bondage. Many recognized it. In fact, Thomas Jefferson’s original draft of the document included a passage condemning the slave trade, but it was removed to preserve unity among the colonies.
The reality is that the American experiment likely never would have begun had the founders insisted on immediate abolition. The colonies were deeply divided on the issue, and without a united front, independence from Britain would almost certainly have failed. The founders made a fateful compromise, choosing first to secure the nation’s existence and leaving future generations to grapple with slavery’s ultimate abolition.
And, as Obama is also well aware, Americans fought a bloody war to end the scourge of slavery that left more than 600,000 mostly white men dead.
Obama went on to emphasize the work that lies ahead for America and the need to find points of unity in an increasingly divided political climate.
Oddly, and perhaps as a subtle jab at President Donald Trump, Obama invoked the “values” of John McCain and Mitt Romney, two of Trump’s most prominent Republican critics: “Every president here today, as different as we are, has tried our best to uphold the values that John McCain and Mitt Romney believed in no less than I did.”
He ended on a hopeful note:
It is our greatest inheritance. The story of America at its best, because it reflects a basic faith in the decency of our fellow citizens and the possibility that, despite all of our differences, we can see each other and understand one another and make common cause together. That’s what I hope every visitor to this center takes away from their experience.
I would gently remind Obama that he, too, “fell terribly short” of one of his central campaign promises: healing the nation’s racial divisions.
While America was not a colorblind society when he took office, race relations had improved markedly over the preceding decades. The country had come a long way since my days as a student in the 1970s, when racial identity often defined how people viewed one another. By the time my children attended school in the 2000s, I saw something different. They didn’t describe their classmates as black, white, or Asian; they described them by their names. The progress was real, even if it was incomplete.
Obama was given a historic opportunity to build on that progress. Instead, neither he nor Michelle Obama appeared willing to abandon the identity politics that shaped their worldviews. The rhetoric may have evolved, but the underlying framework remained the same: black versus white, oppressed versus oppressor, grievance versus responsibility. Rather than encouraging Americans to see one another as fellow citizens, Obama often reinforced the notion that they belonged to competing groups with competing interests.
It is little wonder, then, that polls consistently show majorities of Americans believed race relations deteriorated during his presidency. For all of his soaring promises of unity, Obama’s legacy on race remains far more divisive than transformative.
His rhetoric on the 2024 campaign trail, particularly his shaming of black men who would not line up behind Kamala Harris, made clear that he still sees the world through a rigid racial lens, and Americans, less as individuals than as members of racial voting blocs.
From Fox News:
While the Obama Presidential Center officially opens to the public Friday, the dedication featured a slew of former diplomats, officials and celebrities, such as former Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau, Oprah Winfrey, Nancy Pelosi, Kamala Harris, Steven Spielberg, Hillary Clinton, and former Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Joe Biden.
…
Overall construction costs were reported to be $830 million in 2021 and have likely climbed past the $1 billion mark.
A recent Fox News Digital investigation identified multiple construction firms claiming losses ranging from hundreds of thousands of dollars to tens of millions. [Matt covered this story here.]
Obama’s full remarks can be viewed below:
FULL | Barack Obama delivers heartfelt speech at grand opening of new pr… https://t.co/UpgJjBqRrj via @YouTube
— Mwaqar (@WaqarM2024) June 18, 2026
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Comments
And once more, the SCFOAMF doesn’t fail to disappoint.
Pay your damn contractors before you pontificate on the failings of the Founders, you grifter.
He’s less of a grifter, and more of a Marxist bomb thrower.
Embrace the power of “and.”
Even more so a smug, sanctimonious a-hole.
The founders created a Democratic Republic that has lasted 250 years and did it on about 12 pages. Obummer created a monstrosity of a law that has driven up health care costs and limited access, but he needed 2700 pages to document this farce. Even Nancy Pelosi didn’t read it.
The single worst American that has ever lived.
I have nothing but seething contempt for this traitor.
As to his entirely erroneous view of the founders, let me say this. They were very cognizant of the fact that some day a man would come along with the desire to rob American of their birthright of liberty and went to great pains to construct a framework that would protect us.
As it turns out, that man was Barack Obama.
*spit*
Obama Slams Founding Fathers at Presidential Center Debut: They ‘Fell Terribly Short’.
Bathhouse Barry says size is all important.
So many of us need to learn more about the history of slavery in the new world. Going back some centuries, European merchants and explorers were looking for a route to China, the orient. They were looking to trade their crafts and goods for the riches of the orient. They loaded their rickety old sail boats and. Set sail from ports in England and other European ports heading south hugging the coast eventually reaching. Africa and encountered native tribes.. These were basically Stone Age. People with little or no material goods. These tribes fought among each other and opponents that were not killed were taken as slaves. Slaves were the only thing they had to trade for the wonderful items the Europeans introduced to them. England, Spain and other Europeans merchants introduced African slaves to their respective colonies in the new world..Actually England sent huge numbers of Irish trouble maker and others who were unable to pay debts, to the colonies as slaves or indentured servants..Black Africans were not the only slaves brought to the colonies..There were black and white slaves! And the so called Native American tribes fought among the tribes and took slaves that were used for labor, sex and trade. Slavery has been recorded in biblical times and probably Earlier. All over the world. Can. We judge what was common practice for thousands of years in most if not all cultures. We are not responsible for “sins” of the past.
Contrary to all the moral posturing, slavery was a good thing, and was worldwide for a reason. In a “hit the guy on the head and take his stuff” economy, it’s a win/win. Instead of killing your enemy, you enslave him.
It’s an inefficient economy because all your capital goes into defense and none into production. The West made slavery obsolete with a more efficient system: a slave contributes more working in his own interest than for a master. That’s from the free market and rule of law, a gift to the world from the West.
At that point slavery was economically obsolete and surviving on bogus “social” reasons like tradition and “naturally subservient race,” reasons which were doomed and in fact ended.
Slavery was a good thing?
Tell you what… You head overseas to a region that still practices slavery and offer yourself up as tribute. Tell them you’re a big fan of servitude.
Then report back to us on how you make out.
Of all the benighted things to say…
You are aware of the history of slavery, aren’t you? There were various conditions which resulted in slavery, some of which had nothing to do with kidnapping or conquest and in fact were purely due economic necessity. In a situation of extreme penury, slavery could be the difference between “three hots and a cot” and starving to death.
You really don’t much about slavery beside the idioitic potrayal of it by bleeding-heart leftists. It was very complex.
For example, in the South when it wasn’t planting or harvesting time, slaves could hire themselves out for wages. They could do the same on Sundya They couldn’t be forced, by custom or law (depending), to work on Sundays.
There were slave bars, dance halls, etc. Theses evolved into the post-slavery ‘Juke Joints.’ That’s where the Blues was born.
And there was much more. And I’m not trying to make sound ‘nice.’ It wasn’t. But it wasn’t the one-side horror-fest you get from most of your modern takes.
For example, in 1839 almost half of the free blacks in Cincinnati, Ohio, had bought their freedom. Maybe read-up on John Berry Meachum, William Troy, Elizabeth Keckley, Moses Grandy, and Venture Smith among many who worked side-hustles off the plantation to earn their freedom.
Slavery was never a good thing. Granted the practice of slavery was practiced world wide on various scales. It was also white europeans and northern whites in north america which played the biggest role in terminating the practice. England was one of the first countries to ban slavery in 1807, then most of europe 1810-1840 and by the northern states in the US circa 1770-1780, and the southern states via the civil war. mexico ended slavery in 1829. Ending slavery in the rest of the world was much slower. It is still practiced in much of the muslim world
I’m so glad this prolapsed asshole is no longer President.
He’s running the Democrap party instead (read: rigging the midterms).
That explains the ears: hemorrhoids!
Man, Big Mike must be running him through!🤣🤣🤣
“this prolapsed asshole”
Don’t go so easy on him
Obama’s blindness to his own failings is monumental. He not only failed as POTUS but set back race relations fifty years. The judges he appointed have done more harm than the Japanese at Pearl Harbor. His legacy is one of no responsibility or concern for the welfare of our people, only himself and his cronies.
That is absolutely correct.
Race relations had been making slow, but steady progress (albeit very slow progress) . DEI and critical race theory exploded during his term, setting up resentment and reversing much of that steady progress.
Obama the Divider-in-Chief. What a miserable POS, including his miserable POS “wife.” Problem with that monolith is there is no window from which to defenestrate the power-mad couple.
I am sure there is a way to the roof…..all figuratively speaking, of course.
Best thing about UFC Freedom 250 was Josh Hokit outing Michelle Obama as a dude.🤣🤣🤣
Hey Moose, Rocko- Help the former President find his checkbook.
Oh dear! We have disappointed Him again!
In Obama’s view, the founders failed to create the Soviet Union when given the opportunity.
Such dumb shit only exceeded by those who voted for him who would still vote for him.
Same as he ever was: Attack, Demonize, Divide. Insult. Demoralize.
What I do on Obama’s grave when he shuffles off this mortal coil won’t pass for flowers. Bless his heart.
Obama’s full remarks can be viewed below:
No thanks. I have grass growing to watch. WAY more important.
Barack Obama thinks too highly of himself as a Statesman, a Scholar and pray tell, a Philosopher.
He is none of those things.
He’s simply a pain in the ass and a big mouth that hasn’t a clue what he speaks of oftentimes.
He’s lucky he’s not spending the rest of his days in prison for what he did to this nation and the incoming administration.
If he had any sense whatsoever he would shut the hell up stay out of public view.
But he just can’t seem to help himself…
He keep talking because he loves the sound of his own voice
Obama is great at twisting history and words. He knows that slavery in what would become the USA was first by British of white people from Ireland, Scotland, Wales, and Britain that were political and criminal prisoners. Later this was ended by the Civil War and great changes by the Republican Party in the US Constitution. As a Dem they lie and lie always.
He has had the Big Trash Can built in a wrong place that local people do not like and has stiffed his contractors. He has done the same with getting book money in the millions but not writing a book. He is good at promising something but never delivering.
Maybe Bill Ayers doesn’t feel like writing another Obongo “autobiography.”
Obama doing all he knows. How to be a divisive community organizing POS. Seeking to fundamentally transform something he hates….American liberty and independence free from totalitarian ideologies and control.
Thats a mirror not the founders.
The FF may have fallen short, but not nearly as short as his architect.
It looks like a grain elevator.
I bet all his fat cat performers got paid up front…..and not one of them could drop a few buck to help the minority owned contractors that Bammy is stiffing.
A POS indeed….
What does Obama know about fathers? He never had one.
Actually he seems to have at least 3 but I’m not sure any claim him as one of their own.
Universal sufferage is part of the reason why this country is in the mess it’s in. There was wisdom in the FF’s decision to limit the franchise. We may disagree with how they chose to limit it, but in general it is a prudent measure to take.
Sorry to say, but some people are simply too stupid to be entrusted with the responsibility of voting.
As a prominent member of the democrat party, the champions of the peculiar institution, this might have been a good time for the One to apologize on behalf of his vile party’s support of slavery. And Jim Crow. And let’s throw in the democrats’ KKK enforcers. Weird. There seems to be a pattern here somewhere but I can’t quite put my finger on it.
Will bathhouse Barry ever be exposed for the fraud he is?
Gollum, calling the Hobbits “terribly short.”
They just want to burn this country to the ground and rebuild it in their own sick, twisted, progressive leftist ideology…to hell with them all.
He’s such a judgmental a-hole. And, FWIW, I wish voting was restricted to property-owning individuals that are 21 or older. I have long since noticed the socialistic-parasitism of the welfare state. Those that seem to want to implement it are, mostly, those who can’t succeed in society coupled with bleeding-heart champagne socialists..
We have some of it which holds us back. But when I look at Europe, it’s a mess. They have had long periods (up to 8 consecutive years) of negative GDP (inflation adjusted) growth. And the US GDP has out-grown theirs by 15.4% over the past two decades as they’re often close to stagnant.
And that includes our 2008-2009 housing crisis which played havoc on our GDP growth. (And yet was somehow worse for them!!!)
25+ property owning who have completed some service and can pass a basic citizenship test.
Once I had to go to Philadelphia for a business trip and had a weekend to explore some of our historical sites there (thank goodness this was before the signs were ‘woke’.). When you look at the huts in Valley Forge (which though rustic were far better than the huts were back during the war), you saw the committment the founders and soldiers towards making a new land. Every one of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence knew that they were putting their lives on the line when they signed and many of the were executed and/or lost their wealth. The only reason that BO can stand there, pontificating the failures he projects is that they sacrificed for him. He had the opportunity to be the President of the greatest Republic ever and he squandered his eight years building hate and division.
My bottom line reason for voting for Trump after two terms of The One was that my sense was that Trump doesn’t hate the US in general and people like me–straight white male — in particular.
Unlike Barry Sotero.
I voted for Trump because I despised what the democrats were trying to do with their unprincipled unAmerican lawfare. Also, the US is Trump’s second favorite thing in the world.
Saying inspiring words is one thing…. but how they are interpreted and implemented are something else. The Founders understood the shortcomings and put in place limitations that BHO wants to eliminate.
Foreign trailer trash, elevated by a treasonous political machine, the democraps, alternately known as the communist regime.
No one ever seeks to “fundamentally transform” something that they love.
Obama loves Pakistan.
Obama loves Iran.
The US? Not so much.
Insane that the media and the Democrats (BIRM) pitched this guy as a uniter. Easily the most divisive person in US politics in our entire history.