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Apparently Oprah Was Just ‘Joking’ About Running For President

By Stacey Cole
Published on: 07:26 PST, Mar 12, 2017

Oprah Winfrey was apparently joking about running for President in 2020 – or at least that’s how her close pal, Gayle King, interpreted Oprah’s recent interview, according to Deadline.

Oprah sparked speculation earlier this month when she suggested that she’s rethinking her chances of becoming U.S. President. But King shut down all the speculation and rumors by saying that the media mogul was “clearly” joking.

Speaking to Deadline, the CBS This Morning co-host said she was in the audience during Oprah’s much-hyped interview on Bloomberg Television’s David Rubenstein Show: Peer-to-Peer Conversations, and he thinks Winfrey was just “playing with David because they have such a great rapport.”

And while King agrees that everyone is entitled to change their mind, he seems to be 100 per cent certain that Oprah running for President in 2020 will never happen.

“I would bet my first, second born and any unborn children to come, that ain’t never happening.”

In her interview on Bloomberg Television earlier this month, Oprah suggested that she’s thinking of running for president in four years to take over from Donald Trump. During the interview, Rubenstein argued that Oprah might want to run for president given her popularity in the country, as well as the fact that the U.S. still hasn’t “broken the glass ceiling yet for women,” according to Entertainment Weekly.

But Oprah was quick to answer that she had actually never thought of such a possibility. And then she playfully made one of her signature “oh-oh” realizations, suggesting that she had just started thinking about this possibility. To further push Oprah towards making her decision in favor of running for commander-in-chief in 2020, Rubenstein reminded the media mogul that people don’t even need previous government experience to be elected President of the United States.

Oprah replied that this was exactly what she thought.

“I thought, ‘Oh gee, I don’t have the experience. I don’t know enough. I don’t…’ And now I’m thinking, ‘Oh. Oh.'”

Despite being a powerful and influential voice all across the U.S. for decades, Oprah had never endorsed a presidential candidate before Barack Obama announced he was running for President in 2008. Last year, Oprah also endorsed Hillary Clinton in her presidential race against current U.S. President Trump. In her interview with T.D. Jakes the month before November’s Election Day, Winfrey urged Americans to vote for Clinton even if they don’t like the Democratic candidate.

“Do you like this country? You better get out there and vote.”

In the same interview, Oprah called Trump a “demagogue.” However, shortly after Trump’s surprise victory was announced, Oprah seemed to have changed her opinion about the then-U.S. President-elect.

Oprah told Entertainment Tonight in November, 2016, that seeing Trump and Obama meet in the White House “gave her hope” and said she could “breathe now” after realizing that Trump may not be as bad as many thought.

Last month, comedian John Oliver blamed Trump’s presidency on Oprah. Oliver said during his chat with Seth Meyers on Late Night that it’s Oprah’s fault that Trump became the most powerful man in the world. Oliver joked that Oprah promoting The Secret, the Rhonda Byrne-written book that explains the Law of Attraction that teaches people to simply visualize things that they want to make them real, was actually the reason that Trump became the U.S. President in 2016.

Oprah was apparently the one responsible for the worldwide success of The Secret after she promoted the book on her daytime talk show in the 2000s. And Oliver thinks that The Secret actually worked for one person, Trump, who visualized becoming the most powerful man in the world. And he did.

[Featured Image by Mike Windle/Getty Images]

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oprah winfrey john oliver Barack Obama Gayle King
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