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Oprah on Obama Win: 'We Did This'

TV host plans special election show today

By Matt Cantor, Newser Staff

Posted Nov 5, 2008 9:40 AM CST

(Newser) – Oprah Winfrey began to open up about the election last night in Chicago, and today on her show, she’ll “unleash” her views on Barack Obama’s victory, her website says. “This happened because we did this,” she told Mark Halperin at Obama’s rally. "We did this." The talk-show host kept quiet about the election after some viewers were less than thrilled with her endorsement of the now president-elect.

Asked about her role in an Obama administration, Halperin reports in Time reports, she said she’d “already had a role. My role was to use my voice to introduce him to as many people who didn't know him as possible. I had no agenda.” She said the “defining moment” of the campaign was Jeremiah Wright and Obama’s Philadelphia speech on race. “After he stood in Philadelphia I said, ‘Oh, my God, this is a different kind of leader.’”

[Images (2)]

[Videos (1)]

[Quotes (2)]

Oprah Winfrey waits with Stedman Graham at the election night party for President-elect Barack Obama at Grant Park in Chicago, Tuesday night, Nov. 4, 2008. (AP Photo/M. Spencer Green)

In this Dec. 9, 2007 file photo, Sen. Barack Obama reacts as Oprah Winfrey introduces him to the crowd at a rally in Manchester, NH (AP Photo/Elise Amendola)

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Oprah speaks up on CNN. (bfeems)

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I think he's going to do something for the world. One of my favorite quotes through all of this was Collin Powell when he gave that powerful endorsement: He said that Barack Obama understands that all villages matter. - Oprah Winfrey

His steadfast calmness throughout this whole thing has shown all of us what it means to be a leader. I mean, that's who I want leading this country. - Oprah Winfrey

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Oprah on Obama Win: 'We Did This'