Former First Lady Michelle Obama responded to a reported rift with President Joe Biden’s family this week.
On Wednesday, Axios published a report detailing that Michelle Obama had recently become frustrated with the Biden family over her friend, Kathleen Buhle’s divorce from President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden.
The report cited anonymous sources familiar with the matter and detailed how Michelle Obama has expressed frustrations over the divorce and has appeared to be absent from Joe Biden’s reelection campaign.
However, a spokesperson for Michelle Obama responded to the reports, telling Axios that “she is friends with Kathleen and with the Bidens. Two things can be true.”
The spokesperson, Crystal Carson, also told Axios that Michelle Obama fully supports Biden’s reelection campaign in 2024, where he is expected to face off against former President Donald Trump.
Andrew Bates, a White House spokesperson, also responded to the report, telling Axios, “The Biden and Obama families are like family to one other, and whomever made these claims about that relationship isn’t familiar with it.”
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Newsweek reached out to the White House via email for comment. Newsweek also reached out to the Obama Foundation via email for comment. Newsweek has been unable to independently verify the reporting from Axios.
Buhle previously testified in Hunter Biden’s federal gun trial where he was found guilty by a Delaware jury. Buhle, 55, and Hunter Biden, 54, married in 1993. The couple, who have three children—Naomi, 30, Maisy, 23, and Finnegan, 23—divorced in 2016.
Buhle claimed in her 2022 memoir If We Break that Hunter Biden’s infidelity and drug use led to the demise of their marriage. She also sued him in 2019, claiming he has not paid her alimony legal fees, interest, and other debts owed to her since their split.
Hunter Biden was found guilty of three felony gun charges last month after prosecutors accused him of lying about his status as a drug user when purchasing a firearm in 2018. Section 922(g)(3) of the United States Code states it is against the law for anyone who is an “unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance” to possess a firearm.
According to Axios, Hunter Biden detailed the friendship between Michelle Obama and Buhle in his 2021 memoir, Beautiful Things.
He wrote that the two “worked out together at the gym and often had evening cocktails at the White House, at both formal and informal events.”
A spokesperson for Michelle Obama also told Axios that First Lady Jill Biden recently attended a memorial service for Obama’s mother.
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.