--- title: President Obama's North Carolina Rally Gets a Heckler description: When a protestor interrupted President Obama's afternoon rally for Hillary Clinton in North Carolina on Friday, the crowd was not having it canonical: https://time.com/4559072/barack-obama-north-carolina-rally-heckler-video/ author: Maya Rhodan article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-11-04T20:46:50.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-19T07:45:23.249Z article:section: Politics og:title: Watch President Obama Defend a Protester at His North Carolina Rally og:description: "First of all—hold up—we live in a country that respects free speech" og:url: https://time.com/4559072/barack-obama-north-carolina-rally-heckler-video/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blta690d54608f006f5/6988ad170a4a2212b89cbeda/obama-trump-supporter.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2560 og:image:height: 1440 og:image:alt: Barack Obama og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Watch President Obama Defend a Protester at His North Carolina Rally twitter:description: "First of all—hold up—we live in a country that respects free speech" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blta690d54608f006f5/6988ad170a4a2212b89cbeda/obama-trump-supporter.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Watch President Obama Defend a Protester at His North Carolina Rally > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### 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. by [Maya Rhodan](https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/) ## Maya Rhodan Nov 4, 2016 8:46 PM UTC  A supporter for Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, right, interrupts President Barack Obama's speech at Fayetteville State University in Fayetteville, N.C., on Nov. 4, 2016. A supporter for Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, right, interrupts President Barack Obama's speech at Fayetteville State University in Fayetteville, N.C., on Nov. 4, 2016. Pablo Martinez Monsivais—AP by [Maya Rhodan](https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/) ## Maya Rhodan Nov 4, 2016 8:46 PM UTC When a protestor interrupted [President Obama’s afternoon rally](http://time.com/4554760/why-president-obama-is-going-on-the-radio/) for [Hillary Clinton](http://search.time.com/?q=Hillary+Clinton) in North Carolina on Friday, the crowd was not having it. The Fayetteville crowd attempted to drown the heckler out with chants of U-S-A and boos. Obama, however, said, “hold up.” “Everybody sit down and be quiet for a second,” the President said. “You’ve got an older gentleman who is supporting his candidate. He’s not doing nothing. You don’t have to worry about him.” The crowd, for a while, wouldn’t listen and only chanted louder. Yet Obama continued to come to his defense and eventually got the crowd quiet enough to lay out reasons why the man deserved the respect of the crowd. The scene wasn’t unfamiliar given the tumultuous nature of the 2016 campaign. At rallies across the U.S., protesters have interrupted candidates and surrogates on both sides of the aisle. But on Friday, instead of calling for the man’s removal or heckling him back as he’s done in the past, the Obama told the crowd he deserved their respect and urged them to vote instead of boo. “First of all—hold up—we live in a country that respects free speech. Second of all, it looks like maybe he might have served in our military and we gotta respect that. Third of all, he was elderly and we gotta respect our elders,” Obama said. “And fourth of all, don’t boo. Vote.” The Fayetteville stop was the first of two Obama was scheduled to make in North Carolina on Friday. The commander-in-chief has [morphed into the campaigner-in-chief](http://time.com/4557060/barack-obama-florida-rally/) with days to go before the election, recently making appearances for Clinton every day. All of the stops have been in states where the race is looking close, and his pitches have been aimed at his [coalition of voters](http://time.com/4554760/why-president-obama-is-going-on-the-radio/), including millennials and black voters. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4559072/barack-obama-north-carolina-rally-heckler-video/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4559072/barack-obama-north-carolina-rally-heckler-video/"},"headline":"Watch President Obama Defend a Protester at His North Carolina Rally","datePublished":"2016-11-04T20:46:50.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-19T07:45:23.249Z","description":"\"First of all—hold up—we live in a country that respects free speech\"","url":"https://time.com/4559072/barack-obama-north-carolina-rally-heckler-video/","keywords":["2016 Election","2016 Election","Barack Obama","White House","Obama"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blta690d54608f006f5/6988ad170a4a2212b89cbeda/obama-trump-supporter.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Maya Rhodan","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blta690d54608f006f5/6988ad170a4a2212b89cbeda/obama-trump-supporter.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Barack Obama","caption":"A supporter for Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, right, interrupts President Barack Obama's speech at Fayetteville State University, Friday, Nov. 4, 2016 in Fayetteville, N.C., during a campaign rally for Democratic presidential candidate","creditText":"Pablo Martinez Monsivais—AP","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/4559072/barack-obama-north-carolina-rally-heckler-video/","name":"Watch President Obama Defend a Protester at His North Carolina Rally"}}]}] ```