Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee is doubling down on his criticism of President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama’s parenting skills.
In a Sunday interview with ABC’s “This Week,” Huckabee mocked a 2012 quote from a Glamour magazine interview with the president in which he admitted he is sometimes uncomfortable listening to certain rap lyrics with his teenage daughters Malia and Sasha.
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“It was President Obama … who said that some of the lyrics he won’t listen to with his daughter because it embarrasses him,” Huckabee told host Martha Raddatz. “Well, here’s my point. If it embarrasses you, then why would you possibly think it’s wholesome for your children to put it into their heads?”
Huckabee, who sought the GOP nomination from president in 2008 and may run again in 2016, had previously criticized the Obamas for allowing their daughters to listen to pop star Beyoncé, whose music he has described as “mental poison.”
He told People magazine that the Obamas “are excellent and exemplary parents in many ways.” And then he went on to say, ”I don’t understand how on one hand they can be such doting parents and so careful about the intake of everything – how much broccoli they eat and where they go to school and making sure they’re kind of sheltered and shielded from so many things – and yet they don’t see anything that might not be suitable for either a preteen or a teen in some of the lyrical content and choreography of Beyoncé, who has sort of a regular key to the door [of the White House].”
The former Fox News host also reportedly attacks Beyoncé in his upcoming book “Gods, Guns, Grits and Gravy.” Huckabee writes that the “Drunk In Love” singer’s husband rapper Jay-Z exploits his wife like a “pimp” and says her dance moves are “best left for the privacy of her bedroom.”
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The Obamas have not responded publicly to Huckabee’s comments, and they have made a concerted effort to keep Malia and Sasha largely out of the public eye. Since the 2008 presidential campaign, the president has maintained that families of politicians should remain “off limits,” but that has stopped some conservatives from taking aim at his children.
Last year, Elizabeth Lauten, a GOP staffer for Rep. Stephen Fincher (R-Tenn.) created a firestorm when she attacked Malia and Sasha for their demeanor and appearance at the annual turkey pardoning ceremony for Thanksgiving. “Act like being in the White House matters to you. Dress like you deserve respect, not a spot at a bar. And certainly don’t make faces during televised, public events,” she wrote on Facebook. Lauten resigned after a widespread backlash to her post went viral.
Meanwhile, former President Jimmy Carter scoffed at Huckabee’s take on the president’s parenting earlier this month. “I think the president is doing a good job,” Carter told TMZ, adding that he doesn’t “agree with much of what Mike Huckabee says.”
Adam Howard