“Leadership matters,” she continued. “The voices at the top matter if we can continue to be susceptible to voices that want to lead by fear and division. That’s why government matters, democracy matters. Voting matters. So I think it starts with having leadership that reflects the direction that we want to go in as a people.”

While discussing the release of her upcoming book, The Light We Carry, Obama took some time to reflect on how the election of Donald Trump in 2016 changed the political landscape of the US.

Obama said the electoral decision “still hurts”, and in her “darkest moment” she does question if her husband Barack Obama’s time in office mattered.

“When I’m in my darkest moment … my most irrational place, I could say, well, maybe [it didn’t matter]. Maybe we weren’t good enough,” she admitted. “But then I look around when there is more clarity … and think more rationally, I think well … today there’s a whole world of young people who are thinking differently about themselves because of the work that we’ve done. And that’s where you can’t allow great to be the enemy of the good.”

Michelle Obama says she won’t run for president despite how much the Trump era of America “still hurts”