June 19, 2013

Politics

Michelle Obama: Barack ‘wasn’t a big smoker’

BY: CHARLIE SPIERING AUGUST 22, 2012 | 12:25 PM
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In an interview with iVillage.com, First Lady Michelle Obama explained that President Obama quit smoking because of his children, not just for his health.

The first lady said that Obama used himself as an example to the girls that as why they shouldn’t start smoking just because “its cool” and explained to them that the habit was hard to break. President Obama quit smoking in 2011.

“It wasn’t the presidency, it wasn’t the pressure from me, it wasn’t even his health, because he wasn’t a big smoker,” Michelle Obama explained, citing their daughters Sasha and Malia as the president’s motivation for quitting.

Michelle Obama added that President Obama would never smoke in front of the girls, so that he wasn’t confronted by them personally about his habit.

“[I]t wasn’t something that they were asking him about every day because they never really have seen him smoke. He’s never smoked around them so it wasn’t part of their daily lives,” she said.

The first lady also revealed that her own mother was a smoker, and that as a girl she would break her mother’s cigarettes them up, hide them, or dip them in hot sauce.

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