Obama Hoping To Finally Get His Washington, D.C., Driver's License
WASHINGTON, DC — Acknowledging that he’s “already put it off for far too long,” President Barack Obama said on Wednesday that, now that he’s found his birth certificate, he hopes to find time next week to finally get his Washington, D.C., driver’s license.
“The DMV makes you jump through so many hoops,” Mr. Obama said.
“I knew that I had [my birth certificate] somewhere, but after moving to Washington a couple of years ago, I hadn’t been able to locate it.”
“Plus, my Illinois license wasn’t expired yet,” he continued, “so I put it off. Probably for longer than I should have.”
After months of looking everywhere he could think of, the president finally stumbled upon his birth certificate when he was least expecting to.
“It was tucked into the endnotes section of Infinite Jest, if you can believe that,” chuckled Mr. Obama.
“I was having an argument with [Jonathan] Franzen over Twitter about what the subtitle to Cage III was, when all of a sudden, there’s my birth certificate.I guess I thought that I was putting it somewhere safe, where I wouldn’t forget about it.
"Well, I guess I ended up hiding it from myself.”
It wasn’t just a lack of proper paperwork that was keeping Mr. Obama from finally making the time to go to the DMV.
“I’ve been super busy with work,” the president said.
“That’s kind of a lame excuse, I know, but who has the time to sit around the DMV all day?”
Mr. Obama admits that his calendar isn’t exactly clearing up.
“If I don’t do it now, when will I?” he said.
“As soon as I get this budget taken care of, I have to pick a day and just get it done, because I’ve got another [presidential] campaign right around the corner, and once I’m into that, forget it.”
The president says that so far he’s been lucky that his drivers license hasn’t been an issue.
“With my job, I don’t do a whole lot of driving,” said Mr. Obama. “When I do, it’s usually late at night to pick up a pack of smokes, or a pint of Ben & Jerry’s or something.
“I drive cautiously, hoping to not get pulled over,” he continued. “And if I do, I could probably talk my way out of it.”
Republican presidential front-runner, golf course manager Donald Trump, has wondered publicly if Mr. Obama will be able to simply switch his Illinois license for a Washington license.
“I’m not saying his current drivers license has been expired for more than three months or not. I don’t know one way or the other,” Mr. Trump said. "I"m hearing a lot of things. Bad things"
“He might have to take the Learner’s Permit Test again,” continued Mr. Trump. “Then we’ll have a little more information regarding his qualifications as a licensed driver.”
“I’m not going to speculate on how I would do on the Learner’s Permit Test,” Mr. Obama said. “The facts are the facts. I won’t have to take the test.”
Shortly after Mr. Obama’s press conference, Fox News released a poll showing that 52% of their viewers believe Mr. Obama would fail the Learner’s Permit Test.
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