Obama speechwriter on Trump’s “healthy regard for dictators”

Ben Rhodes played a key role in crafting both the Iran deal and the historic thawing in relations between the US and Cuba – and was by Obama’s side on all but one of his overseas trips. Here he gives his views on the world after Obama.

Rhodes was deputy foreign policy advisor and speechwriter for the Obama administration, joining the Obama campaign as a speechwriter when he was just 29 years old. Rhodes stayed on for the full eight years of his term, tasked with the role of interpreting and explaining Obama’s vision for the world.

In a new book, he reveals that after the election of Donald Trump, Obama wondered whether his presidency came too early, for a world that wasn’t ready.