U.S. Politics · Elections · 14 outlets (L 8 · C 4 · R 1 · 1 not rated)
Obama mocks White House response to his Cheesecake Factory joke
Former President Barack Obama mocked President Donald Trump's White House response to his weekend joke that the redecorated White House looked like "Saddam Hussein opened a Cheesecake Factory."[3, 12] Speaking at a "United for Georgia" rally on Wednesday while campaigning for Sen. Jon Ossoff and gubernatorial nominee Keisha Lance Bottoms, Obama said Republicans "mobilized a whole-of-government response to that joke, not to inflation."[7, 12] He said Trump was less offended by the Saddam Hussein comparison than by the restaurant reference, calling Republicans "not serious people."[10, 12]
Obama also said he had been a Cheesecake Factory regular for a decade.[13] Trump and members of his administration had responded critically to the joke in the days after it was made.[8]
Why it matters Trump and his administration publicly responded to the joke for days, keeping the dispute alive over White House renovations.[8, 13]
Covered by Atlanta Black Star, ABC News, Washington Examiner and 11 more
Read first Obama knocks White House’s response to Cheesecake Factory jab: ‘These are not serious people’
How balanced is this coverage?
Of the 13 rated outlets that covered it, 8 are left of center (2 of them in the Left group), 4 are center and 1 is right of center (1 of them in the Right group). 1 more is not rated.
- Left: Atlanta Black Star (−2.03), Crooks and Liars (−1.26).
- Leans left: Daily Kos (−1.22), NewsOne (−1.18), HuffPost (−1.06), Raw Story (−0.94), MS NOW (−0.76), The Daily Beast (−0.64).
- Center: ABC News (−0.19), Business Insider (−0.09), Mediaite (+0.04), The Hill (+0.10).
- Leans right: none.
- Right: Washington Examiner (+1.34).
Not rated Al Jazeera. Not placed: they have no lean score.
Each dot is an outlet that covered it, placed by its audience-lean score (Eady et al. 2025), which measures who shares its links, not how accurate it is. The ticks under the line are all 113 rated outlets Tare reads.