It is widely assumed in political circles that President Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, his former secretary of state, hate each other, but "Meet the Press" host Chuck Todd says it isn't so.
"I think everybody assumes they don't," he said, but political rivals often like each other more than their staffs do, Todd said Thursday on
"Conan."
"The two of them have this interesting bond. I think part of it is the bond is almost like they've been to war together," Todd told host Conan O'Brien. They each know the other is the only one who knows what its like to be a candidate, said Todd, who has written a book about Obama's presidency,
"The Stranger: Barack Obama in the White House."
"They have this interesting bond, and I think it sort of throws his staff off sometimes," he said. "They'll go in there and they share inside jokes, and they'll go, you're not supposed to be that friendly. We keep telling people you're not that friendly.
"But they're oddly very close."
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