Months of programming, of selecting guests, from Steven Spielberg a George Clooney e Oprah Winfrey, meetings to organize the service of two hundred employees, from catering to security, inside and outside the villa. Everything useless. The former president Barack Obama has canceled the mega party that was supposed to be held today, Wednesday, the day of his 60th birthday, on the estate of Martha’s Vineyard, the island off the coast of Massachusetts. “Due to the new spike in contagions of the Delta variant – a spokeswoman announced – the president and Mrs. Obama have decided to downsize the event, involving only family and a few friends”.
Almost five hundred guests were invited, including Hollywood stars and wealthy donors from the Democratic Party, ready to participate in what would be the most important social event of the year. A mega reception at the twelve million dollar Edgartown mansion, eleven acres of woods and lawns overlooking the ocean, and a villa with seven bedrooms, eight and a half baths and stone fireplaces everywhere. The party would be held entirely outdoors. The Covid problem was present from the beginning: the Obamas had asked that every guest be vaccinated. “Yes, they were worried – confirmed the former presidential adviser, David Axelrod – but when they had planned everything, the situation was very different from now. “The daily average of infections in the United States went from 11 thousand in June to 92 thousand in the last week, a peak reached in late October, before the frightening surge between November and January.
From Clooney to Spielberg, the big party with the stars for Obama’s 60th anniversary
by our correspondent Anna Lombardi
Boomerang risk
By the time the White House announced the arrival of new restrictions, the mega party story would have been a boomerang for Democrats, and tarnished a bit the image of the most popular president of the past two decades. A low-key party, for a few people, was considered the best solution. Axelrod himself will no longer attend the party, as well as Obama’s former first chief of staff, Cream Emanuel and the president of the Obama foundation, Marty Nesbitt. This time the parties have reversed with the president of the United States, Joe Biden: it was Obama who followed his former deputy, who had already announced for some time that he would not attend the party, and who in recent days has appealed to the Americans to get vaccinated, in the face of an increasingly dramatic situation. The old friend gave him public greetings on Twitter: “Happy birthday. I am proud to call you brother and friend, I am grateful for your selfless service to this nation.”
Greetings arrived, via social media, from his former secretary of state, Hillary Clinton: “Happy Birthday my friend”. Even the White House chief of staff, Ronald Klain, had declined the invitation, while the governor of Massachusetts, the Republican Charlie Baker, he had said that he had not been invited but that, even if he had been called, he would not go. “Putting seven hundred people, including guests and employees, in a confined space – he commented – is not a good idea”. Baker avoided remembering that he lifted the limit on every gathering since May, but the fact remains that contagions have increased in Martha’s Vineyard County.
.