--- title: Obama: Donald Trump's Nomination 'Says Something' About GOP description: President Barack Obama said Donald Trump's nomination as the Republican presidential candidate "says something" about how the GOP changed. canonical: https://time.com/4421044/president-obama-donald-trump-gop/ author: TIME Staff article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-07-24T19:36:32.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-19T07:45:52.352Z article:section: Politics og:title: President Obama: Donald Trump's Nomination 'Says Something' About GOP og:description: About how it has changed over the last 15 years og:url: https://time.com/4421044/president-obama-donald-trump-gop/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb74593b1c1c7370a/69889f073c1639786845e2d2/gettyimages-578958194.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1024 og:image:height: 576 og:image:alt: &lt;&gt; on July 22, 2016 in Washington, DC. og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: President Obama: Donald Trump's Nomination 'Says Something' About GOP twitter:description: About how it has changed over the last 15 years twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb74593b1c1c7370a/69889f073c1639786845e2d2/gettyimages-578958194.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # President Obama: Donald Trump's Nomination 'Says Something' About GOP > Sponsored content. 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It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, twice a week. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3/newsletters?i=14257936-2381-4fb6-bac2-918267b6cdd6&cr=time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3-v1) by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Jul 24, 2016 7:36 PM UTC  President Barack Obama is pictured here on July 22, 2016 in Washington, DC. President Barack Obama is pictured here on July 22, 2016 in Washington, DC. Mark Wilson—2016 Getty Images by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Jul 24, 2016 7:36 PM UTC President Barack Obama [in a new interview](http://www.cbsnews.com/news/obama-presidency-clinton-dnc-trump-foreign-policy-george-bush/) said Donald Trump’s nomination as the Republican presidential candidate “says something” about how the GOP has changed in the last decade or so. [The president](http://time.com/4419849/president-obama-donald-trump-speech/) touted presumptive Democratic hopeful Hillary Clinton’s strengths as he criticized [Trump ](http://time.com/4418398/donald-trump-convention-speech/)and his inflammatory rhetoric in a taped interview with CBS’s John Dickerson that aired Sunday on _Face the Nation_. “I think it says something about what’s happened to the Republican Party over the course of the last 8, 10, 15 years,” Obama said about Trump’s rise to being the GOP’s pick for president. “If you think about what a Bob Dole, or a Jim Baker, or a Howard Baker, or a Dick Lugar, or a Colin Powell stood for, yeah, they were conservative. They were concerned about limited government, and balancing budgets, and making sure we had a strong defense,” he added. “But they also understood that our system of government requires compromise, that Democrats weren’t the enemy, that the way our government works requires us to listen to each other.” Obama later said “that’s not the kind of politics that we’ve seen practiced.” In the interview, he also reiterated that he believes Clinton is qualified for the White House. “She’s not flashy,” he said. “There are better speechmakers . . . but she knows her stuff, and more than anything, that is what is ultimately required to do a good job in this office.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4421044/president-obama-donald-trump-gop/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4421044/president-obama-donald-trump-gop/"},"headline":"President Obama: Donald Trump's Nomination 'Says Something' About GOP","datePublished":"2016-07-24T19:36:32.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-19T07:45:52.352Z","description":"About how it has changed over the last 15 years","url":"https://time.com/4421044/president-obama-donald-trump-gop/","keywords":["2016 Election","2016 Election"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb74593b1c1c7370a/69889f073c1639786845e2d2/gettyimages-578958194.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb74593b1c1c7370a/69889f073c1639786845e2d2/gettyimages-578958194.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"<> on July 22, 2016 in Washington, DC.","caption":"President Barack Obama is pictured here on July 22, 2016 in Washington, DC.","creditText":"Mark Wilson—2016 Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/2016-election/","name":"2016 Election"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4421044/president-obama-donald-trump-gop/","name":"President Obama: Donald Trump's Nomination 'Says Something' About GOP"}}]}] ```