Oprah Winfrey said recently she had no interest in running for president in 2020, casting doubt on speculation about her political aspirations.
In an interview with InStyle editor-in-chief Laura Brown three weeks before her powerful Golden Globes speech earlier this month, the 63-year-old entertainment icon said she had met with someone who offered to help with a political campaign, but she shut them down. InStyle published the interview on Thursday.
“I’ve always felt very secure and confident with myself in knowing what I could do and what I could not,” Oprah said during the interview. “And so it’s not something that interests me. I don’t have the DNA for it. ... That’s not for me.”
Speculation about a potential Oprah 2020 presidential campaign began swirling this month following her Golden Globes speech.
Members of Oprah’s inner circle, including her longtime partner Stedman Graham and CBS’ Gayle King, hinted that she might consider running.
“It’s up to the people,” Graham told the Los Angeles Times when asked about a possible campaign. “She would absolutely do it.”
While there has been an outpouring of support for a President Oprah, the media mogul suggested during the InStyle interview that it wouldn’t be a good move for her personally.
“Gayle ― who knows me as well as I know myself practically ― has been calling me regularly and texting me things, like a woman in the airport saying, ‘When’s Oprah going to run?’” Oprah told Brown. “So Gayle sends me these things, and then she’ll go, ‘I know, I know, I know! It wouldn’t be good for you ― it would be good for everyone else.’”
CLARIFICATION: This article has been edited to note when Oprah’s interview with InStyle was conducted.