Over the past year, rumors have been swirling that Barack and Michelle Obama are heading for divorce. According to these rumors, Barack and Michelle have been living “separate lives” for quite some time.
Now, Michelle is speaking out to reveal the “crazy” part of her and Barack’s daughters Malia and Sasha’s lives. This comes as the Obama divorce rumors are continuing to spread like wildfire.
‘This Is Crazy…’
While appearing on the “Baby, This Is Keke Palmer” podcast, Michelle discussed how she helped her daughters adapt to life in the White House. When they moved into the iconic home, Malia was 10 and Sasha was 7.
“With them, it was really just trying to keep them focused on their lives. They could never miss school or something that they had to do for school because something cool was happening right at the White House,” explained Michelle, 62. “They only traveled with us on their breaks – so summers, and there’s spring break when they weren’t at camp – so the goal was to make their lives as normal as possible.”
Michelle went on to recall a “crazy” moment that took place during their first trip as the first family to Russia. This seemingly caused some tension, as it caused Michelle to confront Barack as she defended their daughters.
“They maybe slept for three hours on the plane with jet lag. And I had to go in and wake them up knowing that they hadn’t had sleep,” Obama said. “I was like, this is crazy. I told [Barack], ‘This is ridiculous.'”
‘Mama Bear’ Comes Out
As soon as they got off the plane, the girls had to greet the Russian people with their parents before getting in a limousine headed for the Kremlin. Michelle noticed how much Malia and Sasha were struggling. That’s when her “mama bear” side came out.
“Malia says, ‘I’ve never felt this bad in my whole life.’ And I said, ‘Honey, that’s jet lag,'” Michelle recounted. “After that trip, we told our team, ‘Don’t ever do that. Don’t plan a trip that if we land, the kids have to work right away.’ So from then on it was like, if they haven’t had their sleep, they’d get in a separate car and go to the hotel.”
Michelle went on to admit to having “long, messy conversations” with staffers about scheduling children versus adults. This only got harder as Malia and Sasha got older.
“It’s a teenage schedule, and it’s kind of chaotic, but you’re making them drive in your car. So now you have to adapt to how they live,” Michelle insisted. “They have to be polite, but they can’t be held back because somebody has to make a shift change.”
“I don’t need freedom every second,” she added. “I can operate with a clear schedule. My kids are not going to be forced to do that in their developmental years. They need to learn to live life.”
“You have to teach people what your rules are,” Michelle concluded of dealing with her staffers. “And so that takes a minute, but we did it at a high level.”
Sounds like working for Michelle is a REAL blast…
Obama Divorce Rumors
Michelle has made this revelation about her daughters at a difficult time for the Obamas. Indeed, Michelle and Barack, 64, have been plagued by rampant divorce rumors for over a year.
These divorce rumors escalated in a big way back in January of last year, when Michelle skipped both the funeral of Jimmy Carter and the inauguration of Donald Trump. She was the only living former First Lady to miss each of these events. This forced Barack to attend both events alone.
“I have been hearing this rumor that the Obamas are getting a divorce by reputable people,” political commentator Meghan McCain said on reporter Tara Palmeri’s podcast in 2025. “I’m not talking about TMZ, I’m not talking about Perez Hilton, although I love him, he’s my friend.”
“I’m talking about like very serious journalists telling me that they’re hearing that the Obama divorce rumors are true,” she continued.
“We’ve heard that for a long time,” replied Tara, who has long covered Washington politics. “Like I just heard that they live separate lives.”
Listen to Meghan and Tara talk more about this in the clip below.
Michelle Accused Of ‘Really Disliking’ Barack
Michelle launched her IMO podcast back in March of last year. Since then, Michelle has used it to bash Barack and air his dirty laundry seemingly every chance she gets.
In fact, Michelle has complained about Barack so many times on her podcast that the former Fox News host Tucker Carlson has claimed that the former First Lady “really dislikes her husband, and it’s super obvious.”
“I’m not just saying that to be catty,” Tucker explained. “I think I’m trying to feel compassion for her but her hostility toward the guy is unbelievable.”
Tucker’s fellow former Fox News host Megyn Kelly was quick to agree. She pointed out that “everything Michelle says about her husband is negative.”
“I almost never say negative things about Doug,” Megyn added, referring to her own husband Doug Brunt. “He’s not perfect but when I think about him, I don’t immediately go to whatever is negative. I go to what’s positive and what I love about him.”
The Obamas Respond
Back in July of last year, Barack appeared on Michelle’s IMO podcast. There, they desperately tried to shoot down the escalating divorce rumors.
“There hasn’t been one moment in our marriage where I thought about quitting my man,” Michelle claimed. “And we’ve had some really hard times. So we had a lot of fun times, a lot of adventures, and I have become a better person because of the man I’m married to.”
“These are the kinds of things that I just miss, right?” Barack chimed in to add. “So I don’t even know this stuff’s going on. And then somebody will mention it to me and I’m all like, ‘what are you talking about?'”
Unfortunately for the Obamas, however, many are still not buying their claims that their marriage is still going strong.
Michelle complaining about “crazy” times in her daughters’ lives that seemingly led to tension between her and Barack will certainly do nothing to help her case that all is well in her marriage. Only time will tell if the Obama marriage will actually survive!