Tuesday at the Pennsylvania Conference for Women, former first lady Michelle Obama said when she attended the State of the Union address she would notice the Republican side was “all men, all white,” and that was why she argued many people of color “don’t trust politics.”

Speaking about diversity, Obama said, “We should be working actively to mix it up, so we’re getting a real broad range of perspectives on every issue. Shoot, I would see that in Congress.”

She explained, “At the State of the Union address … when you are in the room what you can see is this real dichotomy. It’s a feeling of color almost. On one side of the room is literally gray and white. Literally, that is the color palette on one side of the room. On the other side of the room, there are yellows and blues and whites and greens. Physically, there’s a difference in color, in the tone, because on one side all men, all white, on the other side some woman, some people of color.”

She continued, “I look at that, and I go, no wonder. No wonder we struggle, no wonder people don’t trust politics. We’re not even noticing what these rooms look like.”

She added, “If people haven’t had the experience of being other and out, and you are trying to fix the problem of those folks, it’s hard to come up with the right answer when you haven’t lived it.”

Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN

