Conservative websites and commentators roundly mocked first lady Michelle Obama’s remark in a new People magazine interview, in which she recounts an alleged encounter with racism in a Target store.
“I’ve heard her talk about that Target visit before and this was definitely a take on it I hadn’t heard from her before,” Sandra Westfall, the journalist who conducted the interview, told the Washington Examiner.
Michelle’s comment, though, struck some as an irrational reaction by the first lady to an innocuous request. She was responding to Westfall’s asking if she had experienced racism while serving as first lady.
“I tell this story — I mean, even as the first lady — that wonderfully publicized trip I took to Target — during that visit, not highly disguised, the only person who actually came up to me in the store was a woman who asked me to help her take something off of a shelf,” Michelle said in the interview. “Because she didn’t see me as the first lady, she saw me as someone who could help her.”
“Hi [Michelle Obama],” tweeted conservative author Michelle Malkin on Wednesday. “Someone asked me to watch her cart in line at Safeway the other day cuz she forgot to get eggs. #RAAACISM.”
“The lesson is never ask anyone for help with anything, ever, no matter the need,” tweeted Dana Loesch, a conservative radio host. “It may be mentioned in People as a racist act.”
“Michelle Obama’s Example of Racism in America: I Was Asked to Get Something Off the Shelf at Target,” read a headline about the quote on the conservative news site TheBlaze.
The trip to a Northern Virginia Target took place in 2011, with Michelle dressed casually, hair up, in baseball cap and sunglasses on her face. Photographers captured the trip, where Obama was reportedly only recognized by the cashier (though she shopped with an assistant). Her Secret Service detail arrived at the store ahead of her and they were also dressed casually.
“We did not get deeper into the Target comment because the president jumped right in,” said Westfall when asked if she had any follow-up questions on Michelle’s remark.
The anecdote came after Westfall asked the Obamas if they have had conversations with their two daughters about racism in the U.S.
Immediately after the Target comment, a transcript of the interview shows that the president began talking about his own experiences with racism, including being mistaken for a valet.
Westfall noted that the interview was “wide-ranging” and was only to last 20 minutes, though it lasted for 30. “We did what we could,” she said.
