CBS, NBC Sunday Shows Squee Over the Grand Opening of New Obama Shrine

Jorge Bonilla
June 21st, 2026 7:33 PM

Text to Speech

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The Obama Presidential Center opened to much fanfare and media coverage last week. The Elitist Media devoted significant chunks of time to covering the new shrine built to their god-king. This devoted coverage spilled over to the Sunday shows.

Watch as CBS’s Margaret Brennan recapped the grand opening on Face the Nation:

MARGARET BRENNAN: There's been a big focus on Washington landmarks in recent months. But this weekend marks the opening of the Obama Presidential Center. All the living former presidents and first ladies gathered for the dedication ceremony at the center on Chicago's South Side, to honor and celebrate the legacy of the nation's first black President.

SPEAKER: Please help me welcome President Barack Obama--

BRENNAN: In his remarks, former President Barack Obama spoke of America's resilience, and urged them to reject division and recommit to each other.

BARACK OBAMA: For us to give in now after all this country has been through, to cynicism and division, would be a betrayal of our founding ideals.

BRENNAN: The former President was visibly moved by a speech from former First Lady Michelle Obama.

MICHELLE OBAMA: Eight years in the crucible and not once did you melt from the heat. You were doing the People's work. Rescuing our economy. Expanding healthcare. Ending a war. Ordering the bin Laden raid. Saving the auto industry. Winning a peace prize.

BRENNAN: The Obama Presidential Center is somewhat a departure from tradition. It was designed to be a place for the community to gather and includes a 19-acre park, a branch of the Chicago Public Library, and an NBA-sized basketball court.

“Somewhat a departure from tradition” is performing an Atlean lift here. The center is a massive departure from normal presidential libraries, just as its underlying presidency was a massive departure from the norms of the office. But then, as now, an adoring media looks the other way and tells the American public that no- this is really awesome. 

It is interesting that Brennan linked the Obama Center to discussion of DC landmarks. Coverage has been extremely critical, whether of the proposed Triumphal Arch, the White House Ballroom, or the work done at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. Obama Center coverage has ranged from deferential to worshipful, and has made ZERO mention of its subcontractors that are still owed tens of millions of dollars.  

Over at NBC, coverage was just as bad. Meet the Press fill-in host Garrett Haake crowed that Obama’s career was defined by “bridging divides and finding common ground:”

GARRETT HAAKE: Welcome back. This week, the Obama Presidential Center opened to the public in Chicago, a lasting tribute to the nation's 44th President. But long before The White House, Barack Obama was a little-known Illinois state senator who burst on to the national stage with his keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. Just months later after winning his election to the U.S. Senate, Obama joined "Meet the Press" to talk about a theme that would come to define his political career, bridging divides and finding common ground.

BARACK OBAMA: I absolutely think that it's possible for us to find common ground. You know, the President called me this week, he was extraordinarily gracious in congratulating me. We both agreed that our wives are sharper than we are, which was -- which was nice. And my sense is that if we can disagree without being disagreeable, and if we’re not involved in the sort of slash and burn politics that I think has become the custom in Washington, but we seek out common ground on the enormous challenges that we face ahead, whether it's the global economy that Karl Rove just mentioned and how we make sure that the middle class is, in fact, sustainable in this global competition, or we're talking about how we provide the education that our children need so that they can succeed. Those are issues where we all share, I think, success and one of the things I told the president was that we all have a stake in seeing him have a successful presidency. I don't think that the Democrats succeed by rooting against the President in office, but we have to be honest where we disagree with him and he's got to make his case where he’s presenting issues that we’re skeptical about.

The nuns and private businesses who the Obama administration tried to force into paying for abortifacients against their religious beliefs may take issue with Haake’s rosy look back at the Obama years, as may the Tea Party-linked groups unduly burdened by the IRS in 2012. 

The record reflects that the Obama years were among the most divisive in the nation’s history. The media’s coverage of Obama then, as now, reminds us of why and how their public trust fell off a cliff. 

 

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