Todd, Cillizza Insist ‘Only Reason People’ Viewed Obama as Liberal ‘Because He’s Black’

Curtis Houck
June 22nd, 2026 7:08 PM

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In their weekly chat on Substack, former CNN and Washington Post reporter Chris Cillizza and former NBC and MSNBC host Chuck Todd quipped on Monday that racism was “the only reason” why the American people view Barack Obama as a liberal president, even though he was only “a degree more liberal than Bill Clinton” and “temperamentally a moderate.”

At one point, Todd declared to Cillizza’s amusement that “[t]he only reason people think he was liberal is because he’s black.”

The conversation seemingly came out of nowhere as the pair were discussing with some dismay the socialist/communist takeover of the Democratic Party. Cillizza said “we” — likely referring to the political establishment and news media — “focus so much on Trump’s hostile takeover of the Republican Party and rightfully so,” but “his influence on the radicalization of the left and the empowerment of the far left is very real, too.”

“This is liberal Tea Party. DSA is the liberal Tea Party,” Todd replied, referring to the Democratic Socialists of America.

Todd invoked Obama: “By the way, Obama radicalized the far right. It was the same thing, right? The far right viewed Obama as some left-winger when Obama was basically a degree more liberal than Bill Clinton, you know?”

Here are a few examples of liberal policies: axing the Keystone XL pipeline, Cash for Clunkers, Dodd-Frank, IRS targeting the Tea Party, ObamaCare, Solyndra, suing nuns, suing journalists, and support for gay marriage are just a few examples that would have been dubious in the Bill Clinton presidency.

Nonetheless, Cillizza claimed Obama was “temperamentally a moderate” but “probably liberal on policy.”

Then came the exchange in question, which ended in Todd defending Obama’s presidency as closer to George W. Bush in terms of ideology than Trump. While that may be true, Americans voted twice for Trump, rejecting both progressivism and compassionate conservativism:

TODD: What policy was he that liberal on, Chris? It’s one of the biggest —

CILLIZZA: It’s because he was black.

TODD: Thank you.

CILLIZZA: Honestly! Like —

TODD: The only reason people think he was liberal is because he’s black.

CILLIZZA: — right.

TODD: Like, it’s this, he — he — he governed more closely to George W. Bush than — than Donald Trump, you know, has.

Todd shifted the conversation to acknowledging a “new liberal argument against Barack Obama...which is, oh, he was a failed president because he didn’t — he didn’t take advantage of — he didn’t know how to use power.”

“Like, the big new criticism of — of Obama is he didn’t know his power. My — look, I — I found — I did a whole thing this morning about sort of, because I got the question, which is how much just Trump impacts the Obama legacy, right? Can you talk about Obama without talking about Trump? And the answer is no, right,” he added.

Unsurprisingly, the liberal former Meet the Press moderator wishcasted Obama had not put his thumb on the scales in 2016 for Hillary Clinton, robbing his fellow lefties of a true, successful “heir” to the Obama legacy (click “expand”):

TODD: The question is knowing, then what you know now, what would you have done differently? And it all, for me, it goes back to endorsing Hillary Clinton, right? Like, that probably was he —

CILLIZZA: Right. In 2016.

TODD: — yeah, it was probably him not understanding why he got the nomination in 2008 in the first place, right? Endorsing Clinton was the right thing to do personally, because the Clintons helped him in 2012. He owed them. There was a quid pro quo. So, what he did personally in playing politics was a pretty savvy move for the — for the — as a leader of the Democratic Party, it was a disastrous move —

CILLIZZA: Yep.

TODD: — it turned out.

CILLIZZA: That’s right. I mean, it’s led to everything else. It led to the Biden resentment. I mean, obviously it led to Clinton losing, but then it led to Biden resenting it and saying —

TODD: Yeah, yeah.

CILLIZZA: — I’m going back in again, his presidency, his refusal to give it up.

TODD: I mean, there’s a lot of forks in the road. So, imagine if – if — if Obama had taken on a different, a younger different running name, Amy Klobuchar, Michael Bennet, Jon Tester —

CILLIZZA: — which they did consider — they did consider, at the end of the second term.

TODD: — yeah, and — look, it’s easy to say, boy, they should have done that.

CILLIZZA: But, well, yeah, of course.

TODD: You know, at the time, it didn’t seem like a necessity. And it seems like why create extra drama when you don’t need to — like, I can’t sit here. Yes, I would say, oh, it probably prevents him — not having a heir apparent was a mistake. And you can’t be a successful legacy leader if you don’t have that — if you didn’t have your heir apparent.

CILLIZZA: Correct. because otherwise it’s a, it’s a, it’s a party of one.

TODD: That’s right.

CILLIZZA: Right. I mean, it’s you, yes — people — I mean, it’s Trump. Yes, Trump can build a coalition to win two national elections, but Republicans can’t. 

Later in the show, Todd argued the Trump administration’s war with Iran and memorandum of understanding is the worst American foreign policy move since launching the Vietnam War (click “expand”):

The Trump presidency is not going to have a spectacular ending. The Trump presidency is going to be a terrible ending, a dumb ending...It is more likely that to sort of, you know, the, the reveal that the emperor has no clothes is more likely to come from something dumb like the reflecting pool then it is to come from something consequential like handing Iran control of the Strait of Hormuz. Like, that is such a consequential mistake. And, like, the literally the worst foreign policy decision now. This is worse than — than — than anything since Vietnam, okay? Vietnam led to way too many more deaths. You cannot say it’s a worse mistake than Vietnam. But this was a catastrophe in as far as it, I guess what’s amazing is how quickly it became a catastrophe, right? Literally handing the keys to the Strait.

That is what should be the beginning of the end of his presidency. But in some ways, a presidency, a President that has been so unserious, right? A President that has been so sort of ignorant about the job itself. Of course, in some ways, this is the fitting end. Now, I don’t know if this is the end. I don’t know if this is what finally triggers, and I’m not saying it will, but it is more likely a dumb story like this is the ending to the Trump era than it is a more consequential mistake, like this giving the Iranians control of the Strait of Hormuz, right? Like even though one is a lot more serious, one would be treated with multiple books..and yet, like all of the ways that this reflecting pool became a story, became irrelevant are — are — are wrapped up in everything Donald Trump has done to destroy the American political system in his last — it — it is all in this nice, neat package, the, you know, the killing of ducks, because they’re obsessed with the algae. And oh, by the way, he just wants this for a photo of, he’s literally gonna care on July 5, what the Reflecting Pool looks like. He just cares about what the Reflecting Pool looks like for the one time he is going to be speaking at it, right? He has this — it is literally, he cares about the cosmetics of the presidency, not the substance.

To see the relevant transcript from the June 22 Substack video, click here.

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