WASHINGTON — Members of the so-called “Obama Alumni Association” feel harassed and abused by the former president whose late-night, drunken conference calls have become annoying, frequent, and less coherent as time goes on.
Hennessy’s View has learned that Obama began these occasional conference calls with a handful of former officials about six months after leaving office in 2017. Over time, the 44th president stopped following a semi-weekly schedule of planned calls. Instead, he began calling the team at random times, often late at night and, according to some, after he’d been drinking.
“It was nice at first,” said one former appointee who asked not to be named. “You know, getting together and reminiscing on our glory days, cracking jokes about Joe Biden’s hair plugs, or whatever. But, now, it feels more like listening to a friend complaining about their ex four years after the divorce. I mean, move on, right?”
Another member of the Alumni Association was more specific. “I’m worried about him, honestly. The first year was like being in the White House again. Seven o’clock every Thursday. Review of news and issues. A little time to catch up on personal things. But now it’s almost every night—five or six times a week—at eleven o’clock, midnight, one in the morning. And he’s so wasted, now. Slurring, stammering. Just bitching about being too young to retire and too old to start a new career. We’re not life coaches.”
One member of the Association, hoping to stop the late-night calls, leaked a call in which Obama rambled on about the Department of Justice dropping charges against General Michael Flynn.
“I can’t believe the press ran this as a straight story. I recorded that call assuming he was going to go off on early retirement and complain about Biden. But anybody who listens to it has to appreciate the pain we go through on these calls. It’s torture.”
In the leaked call, Obama incorrectly asserted that General Flynn was indicted for perjury. One of his former assistants said, “in the old days, he would never have made a mistake like that. Not on a legal situation. But, after a dozen craft brews, he just sort of wings it. Facts be damned. It’s disappointing, frankly.”
The former president did not respond to a Twitter request for comment.