--- title: Charlottesville Violence: Obama's Response Most Liked Tweet description: Former President Barack Obama's response to the deadly violence in Charlottesville, Va. over the weekend is the most liked tweet ever. canonical: https://time.com/4902523/obama-charlottesville-tweet-most-liked/ author: Helen Regan article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-08-16T03:37:24.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T17:00:28.221Z article:section: Politics og:title: Obama's Charlottesville Tweet Officially The Most Liked Ever og:description: "No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin" og:url: https://time.com/4902523/obama-charlottesville-tweet-most-liked/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt25cc0024be10040c/6988d9e4096a9444f469f2aa/rtx39cnv.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2482 og:image:height: 1396 og:image:alt: Former U.S. President Barack Obama waves after his keynote speech to the Montreal Chamber of Commerce in Montreal og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Obama's Charlottesville Tweet Officially The Most Liked Ever twitter:description: "No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt25cc0024be10040c/6988d9e4096a9444f469f2aa/rtx39cnv.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Obama's Response to the Charlottesville Violence is the Most Liked Tweet of all Time > 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 [Helen Regan](https://time.com/author/helen-regan/) ## Helen Regan Aug 16, 2017 3:37 AM UTC  Former President Barack Obama after his keynote speech at the Palais de Congres in Montreal, Quebec, Canada June 6, 2017. Former President Barack Obama after his keynote speech at the Palais de Congres in Montreal, Quebec, Canada June 6, 2017.Dario Ayala—Reuters by [Helen Regan](https://time.com/author/helen-regan/) ## Helen Regan Aug 16, 2017 3:37 AM UTC Former President Barack Obama’s Twitter response to the deadly violence in Charlottesville, Va. over the weekend is officially the most liked tweet ever. Obama posted a series of tweets Saturday quoting former South African President Nelson Mandela in the wake of clashes between white supremacists and neo-Nazis and protesters. “No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin or his background or his religion,” the first tweet read. “People must learn to hate, and if they learn to hate, they can be taught to love … For love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite,” he continued. The initial tweet, which was accompanied by a photo of the former President smiling at four children in a window, was liked 2.73 million times and retweeted more than 1.1 million times as of late Tuesday. > [](https://twitter.com/BarackObama/status/896523232098078720) Twitter confirmed to TIME that the post became the most liked tweet in the company’s history and it’s the fifth most retweeted tweet ever. Obama’s tweet surpasses Ariana Grande’s response to the [Manchester terrorist attack](http://time.com/4789854/manchester-ariana-grande-concert-blast-tweet/) in which 22 people were killed after attending her concert in May. President Trump has come under fire from all sides of the political divide for being slow to condemn racists and hate groups by name after a white supremacist plowed his car into a crowd of protesters, [killing 32-year-old ](https://www.google.com.hk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwiwi5LF5drVAhWEQpQKHWQFDQwQqUMILDAB&url=http%3A%2F%2Ftime.com%2F4898643%2Fcharlottesville-virginia-rally-victim-heather-heyer%2F&usg=AFQjCNFpbS1fSE1Ty0oT8y9R1p8JiUz9Cw)Heather Heyer. On Tuesday, Trump [reiterated his original comments](http://time.com/4902129/president-donald-trump-both-sides-charlottesville/?xid=homepage), saying that “many sides” were to blame for the violence. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4902523/obama-charlottesville-tweet-most-liked/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4902523/obama-charlottesville-tweet-most-liked/"},"headline":"Obama's Response to the Charlottesville Violence is the Most Liked Tweet of all Time","datePublished":"2017-08-16T03:37:24.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T17:00:28.221Z","description":"The tweet was liked 2.73 million times and retweeted more than 1.1 million times as of late Tuesday","url":"https://time.com/4902523/obama-charlottesville-tweet-most-liked/","keywords":["Barack Obama","Virginia","Racism","onetime"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt25cc0024be10040c/6988d9e4096a9444f469f2aa/rtx39cnv.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Helen Regan","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/helen-regan/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt25cc0024be10040c/6988d9e4096a9444f469f2aa/rtx39cnv.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Former U.S. President Barack Obama waves after his keynote speech to the Montreal Chamber of Commerce in Montreal","caption":"Former U.S. President Barack Obama waves after his keynote speech to the Montreal Chamber of Commerce in Montreal","creditText":"Dario Ayala—Reuters","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/barack-obama/","name":"Barack Obama"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4902523/obama-charlottesville-tweet-most-liked/","name":"Obama's Response to the Charlottesville Violence is the Most Liked Tweet of all Time"}}]}] ```