US President, Barack Obama, said in an interview broadcast Sunday that he has tried to impress upon president-elect, Donald Trump, that running the White House is different from any other job.
The main thing he has tried to convey is that there is a difference between governing and campaigning, Obama said in the interview with ABC News.
Obama said: “What he has to appreciate is as soon as you walk into this office after you’ve been sworn in; you’re now in charge of the largest organisation on Earth.”
He said he has told Trump the operation can’t be managed like a family business and he will have to have a strong team around him.
He said: “You have to have respect for institutions and the process to make good decisions because you are inherently reliant on other folks.”
The interview comes as Obama prepares for a farewell address scheduled to take place Tuesday evening and as he prepares to leave office on January 20, the same day Trump will be inaugurated.
Obama added that he has also talked to Trump about having confidence in US intelligence agencies and knowing that “there are going to be times where the only way you can make a good decision is if you have confidence that the process is working”.
Top US intelligence officials on Friday briefed Trump about their investigation into Russian cyber activities during the presidential election.
They concluded that Russian President Vladimir Putin “ordered” a campaign to influence the election to undermine faith in the democratic process and to hurt Democratic Party candidate Hillary Clinton.
Trump’s reaction was to vow to pursue good relations with Russia, saying on Saturday on Twitter that having a good relationship with Russia “is a good thing, not a bad thing”.
He also issued a statement saying he had “tremendous respect” for the work of the intelligence agencies, contradicting earlier messages that were critical of
intelligence assessments on weapons of mass destruction prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, which proved to be false.
Trump’s spokeswoman, Kellyanne Conway, defended hiss reaction and statement, noting that he highlights that China and other countries also have mounted cyber-attacks against the US government and US businesses.
Conway said the Democratic National Committee left itself vulnerable to the hack prior to the election and said the material revealed made no difference because the majority of U.S. voters already had an unfavourable opinion of Clinton before it came out.
Conway said: “All of this amounts to a very simple fact, the alleged aspirations to interfere with our democracy failed.”
In the interview with ABC, Obama also said he had given Trump advice about using Twitter.
He said from the day Trump becomes president “there are world capitals and financial markets and people all around the world who take really seriously what he says”.
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