Michelle Obama lamented the coverage of her family’s longtime friend and pastor in a joint interview with husband Barack Obama, who is running for the Democratic nomination for president.
“This conversation doesn't help my kids, you know,” Mrs. Obama told NBC’s Meredith Viera. “It doesn't help kids out there who are looking for us to make decisions and choices about how we're going to better fund education.”
NBC released early excerpts of the joint interview Thursday. The full interview will air Saturday.
In addition to the NBC interview, Mrs. Obama appeared on CNN Wednesday to discuss her family’s relationship with Reverend Jeremiah Wright.
“One of the reasons we try to do interviews like this is not to talk about Reverend Wright, but to talk about who we are beyond that caricature,” she said on CNN.” Sometimes things get bogged down.”
Mrs. Obama said, “We’re confident that the American people are ready to move to a different place. We just have to be confident and give them the benefit of the doubt, that they get all the information and we sort of come out of the muck [and] that they’ll be ready to embrace the truth.”
Earlier this week, Mr. Obama denounced Wright for accusing the U.S. government of creating and spreading AIDS among blacks, praising Nation of Islam Leader Louis Farrakhan and equating U.S. efforts in Iraq with terrorism.