Oprah Winfrey Responds To Backlash Over Recent Trump Comments

Understandably many Americans are still highly emotional over the presidential election of Donald Trump and that means that statements from public figures regarding the election are even more highly scrutinized than usual. Oprah Winfrey found this out the hard way when she recently gave her thoughts on President Obama and Trump sitting down together for their first meeting. Many felt her statements sounded like an endorsement or favor for the president-elect and they quickly took to social media to voice their concerns.

Deciding to address the social media firestorm she found herself in as quickly as possible, Oprah Winfrey addressed the backlash she received over her Trump comments to ensure fans that they got her statement confused. While speaking during a Q&A with Ava DuVernay for her remarkable documentary film The 13^th, Winfrey responded to the social media criticism and clarified her remarks. The Huffington Post has her comments on the matter and more.
Via Huffington Post:
During a Q&A between Winfrey and AvaDuVernay after a screening of the documentary “13th,” Oprah addressed the backlash to her tweet, reportedly telling the crowd, “Y’all heard about my tweet problems?” according to Entertainment Weekly. In the discussion, Winfrey expanded upon her initial tweet and acknowledged her mistake in calling for a unified response to an incredibly divisive moment in American history. 
“I couldn’t breathe after the election,” she said. “I was expecting tension, awkwardness, and strain … so when I saw them sitting together, I actually took a picture of the screen that said ‘President-elect Trump honored to meet Obama.’ And President Obama was being so gracious, and I heard Donald Trump say, ‘He’s a good man.’ I heard Donald Trump say, ‘I’m going to be seeking his counsel.’ I literally went [deep breath], ‘I can breathe now.’” 
Winfrey continued, “My mistake, and this is what I know to be true: You can never talk about everybody … Even in your arguments with your husband and your children. Don’t talk about what you should do, what you ought to do — you can only speak for yourself. So what I should have said was, ‘I just took a breath.’” The media icon also admitted that if she could do it again, she’d likely change the hashtag to #CivilityLives instead of #HopeLives because the transition of power was “more civil than I expected it to be.”
In the world of social media there is definitely a tendency to react to things strongly without thorough assessment. Honestly Oprah Winfrey is human and she is entitled to make mistakes, furthermore she has been one of the biggest supporters of the Obama Administration. It’s doubtful that she would just switch her support so quickly when she was a huge supporter of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.