Obama says ‘core democratic principles’ are ‘under attack’ after Trump wins election

The former president gave the speech in Chicago this past Thursday, where he said that he received “groans and eye rolls” from friends when said he would be speaking about democracy at the event. Some he said, thought that "the election proved that democracy is pretty far down on people's priority list."

He went on to make the point that he and others did not get what they wanted in the outcome of the "fierce, hard-fought election" between Trump and Harris and added that "at this moment in history ... core democratic principles seem to be continuously under attack."

Obama then added that "now is precisely the time to ask ourselves tough questions about how we can build our democracies and make them work in meaningful and practical ways for ordinary people."

Trump's win over Kamala Harris in the 2024 election has been labeled a "mandate" by the American people in recent weeks, with many suggesting that since it was the first time in years that a Republican has won the popular vote, it is a sign that the democracy of the US has worked to promote the president-elect's agenda for the White House. Throughout the election, Democrats as well as left-wing pundits have called Trump a "threat to democracy" and similar labels.

Obama later championed the idea of pluralism in America as being key to democracy but said that recently in the US "the alternative is what we've seen" taking place. Without referencing Trump or January 6 directly, he said in his speech that in America there has been an "increasing willingness on the part of politicians and their followers to violate democratic norms, to do anything they can to get their way, to use the power of the state to target critics and journalists and political rivals, and to even resort to violence in order to gain and hold on to power.”