Michelle Obama says the Secret Service doesn’t want her or President Obama hopping in the car with their daughter to give her driving lessons.
{mosads}Appearing Monday on “Live! With Kelly and Michael” to highlight the White House Easter Egg Roll, Obama addressed a question from host Kelly Ripa regarding whether she or her husband would be administering driving lessons.
“It will be neither of us,” the first lady said to chuckles from the audience.
Malia Obama turns 16 in July. Residents of Washington, D.C., are eligible for a provisional driver’s license at 16 1/2 years old after passing a road test.
Michelle Obama said the president’s detail is particularly sensitive to the idea of Malia’s parents getting behind the wheel with her, saying with a laugh, “I don’t think they want him in the state when she’s learning how to drive. So, we will fortunately be able to hand that responsibility over to someone else.”
Obama also revealed to “Live” host Michael Strahan that she and her hubby “love” to embarrass their two kids, including 12–year-old Sasha.
“Barack and I, we’re like any parents. We love to embarrass them,” she disclosed. “So we’re like, ‘I’m going to dance.’ If they’re like looking a little, you know, uninvolved in an event, I’ll just lean over and be like, ‘If you don’t smile, I’m going to start dancing.’ ”
Obama, who started her anti-childhood obesity “Let’s Move” campaign in 2010, added, “They’re like, ‘No, Mom. Please, whatever you do, just don’t move.’ ”
And the commander in chief keeps his own embarrassment arsenal fully stocked. “Barack is like, ‘I’m going to sing. I’m going to start singing. Here I go. Dad feels like a number’s coming on.’ So we love to embarrass them, yes, we’re like any parent.”
The White House resident revealed the challenges of raising children in the spotlight, saying she and her husband “fight every day” to help their daughters “be normal.”
“And now they’re teenagers, so now there’s dances, and there’s driving, and there’s homecoming, and, you know, spring break. It’s all the things that every parent’s dealing with with teenagers, except you have to manage detail, security, staffing,” Obama told Strahan. “And you’re trying to do it in a way where they don’t feel out of place.”
She said of Sasha and Malia, “My kids are not star kids. They do not seek the limelight. They want to be as far away from us — they want to be normal.”