US President-elect Donald Trump rejects an idea posited by First Lady Michelle Obama about the country being in a hopeless state.
The future president took the stage in his final “thank you” tour in Mobile, Alabama, on Saturday, asserting that the nation is replete with “tremendous hope.”
“We have tremendous hope, and we have tremendous promise and tremendous potential,” said the New York billionaire.
“And I actually think she made that statement not meaning it the way it came out,” he added.
"She could not have been nicer," Trump said of Michelle, whom he met along with the president following his November 8 shock victory.
‘A grown-up’ at helm
Trump’s response to the first lady came following her appearance on the CBS, where she described a grim picture of the country in an interview with celebrity talk show host Oprah Winfrey.
"Everything — the [2008] election was all about hope," Winfrey asked the first lady. "Do you think this administration achieved that?"
"I do," Obama said. "Because we feel the difference now. See, now, we're feeling what not having hope feels like."
"Barack didn't just talk about hope because he thought it was just a nice slogan to get votes," she said, suggesting that Trump’s promises were solely meant to get more votes.
"I feel Barack has been that for the nation in ways that people will come to appreciate. Having a grown-up in the White House who can say to you in times of crisis and turmoil, 'Hey, it's going to be okay. Let's remember the good things that we have,'" Obama said.
Michelle confronted Trump when a 2005 recording of his sexually offensive remarks was leaked, in which he bragged about approaching women without their consent.
She reacted to the lewd content of the tape at a Hillary Clinton rally in October, asserting that “the shameful comments about our bodies, the disrespect of our ambitions and intellect, the belief that you can do anything you want to a woman. It is cruel. It’s frightening.”