Robin Roberts Almost Passed On 2012 Obama Interview Over Fear She'd Be Outed As Gay

Robin Roberts interviewed President Barack Obama in 2012.
Robin Roberts interviewed President Barack Obama in 2012.
The White Home by way of Getty Photos

Journalist Robin Roberts says she almost opted out of a historic interview with President Barack Obama a decade in the past over issues she’d be outed as LGBTQ.

The “Good Morning America” anchor first spoke publicly about her sexuality in December 2013, revealing on social media that she’s been in a relationship with girlfriend Amber Laign since 2005.

In an look on “The Ellen DeGeneres Present” this week, nonetheless, Roberts recalled studying that Obama meant to announce his help of marriage equality of their 2012 interview. Provided that she’d not addressed her personal same-sex relationship within the media, she feared that the chat would immediate scrutiny into her personal non-public life.

“I received a name to go to the White Home,” Roberts mentioned. “There was a risk that [Obama] would change his stance on marriage equality. I had not been public but about being homosexual, and I used to be afraid that I could be outed, that folks may marvel, ‘Why is she the one interviewing the president when he’s making this variation in his stance?’”

Watch a clip of Robin Roberts’ interview with Ellen DeGeneres beneath.

After contemplating the worldwide impression of the interview, nonetheless, Roberts got here to her senses.

“It was sort of like a scene out of ‘Moonstruck,’” she defined. “‘Snap out of it, Robin! What are you considering? It’s not about you. This man goes to impression numerous lives.’ And it was at that second that I mentioned, ‘I’m going to cease letting worry hold me from the issues that I wish to do.’”

Roberts ― who's at the moment selling a brand new e-book, “Brighter by the Day: Waking As much as New Hopes and Goals” ― mentioned she’s “so grateful” she determined to decide to the interview, which she now sees as a private and professional turning level.

“Once more, if we simply cease and take into consideration what number of occasions we let worry hold us on the sidelines ... I’m so, so very glad that that’s now not the case,” she mentioned. “I'm not going to get all the pieces that I need in life, and I’m not going to perform all the pieces, however by golly, worry shouldn't be going to be the rationale why I’m not.”

Amber Laign, left, and Robin Roberts, right, have been together since 2005.
Amber Laign, left, and Robin Roberts, proper, have been collectively since 2005.
Raymond Corridor by way of Getty Photos

Elsewhere within the interview, Roberts turned visibly emotional when talking about Laign’s 2021 breast most cancers prognosis. The journalist had breast most cancers herself in 2007, and 5 years later, underwent a bone marrow transplant after being identified with myelodysplastic syndrome, a uncommon blood and bone-marrow illness.

“I’m a puddle each time I take into consideration what Amber goes by means of,” she defined. “However she is being so brave and is dealing with it extraordinarily effectively. I’m in a position to sort of give her a bit of little bit of a highway map, as a result of I’ve gone by means of it. However she’s additionally given me a highway map on be a caregiver.”

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