(CNN) – As President Obama was trying to tout a healthy economy on Friday, one of his top economic advisers was literally getting sick all over the White House.
Democratic officials confirmed to CNN that AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka developed a stomach bug and vomited at the White House as Obama prepared to kick off a meeting of the President's Economic Recovery Advisory Board.
Trumka is a member of the key outside group that also includes economic heavyweights like former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker and former Clinton White House official Laura D'Andrea Tyson, which met Friday to discuss the president's push to create jobs and get Congress to pass strong financial reform legislation.
While Trumka's nausea might not be the best metaphor for the president to play up a healthy recovery, AFL-CIO officials downplayed the incident with good nature.
"While President Trumka is sick of big banks fighting Wall Street reform this was in no way related to that," AFL-CIO spokesman Eddie Vale joked to CNN. "He just had a stomach bug and is now resting so he can get ready for his next fight."
The economic board's meeting went forward without Trumka, and Vale said the mishap will have no impact on Obama's efforts to rescue the economy. "We are extremely pleased with the millions of jobs that have been created and saved and look forward to continuing to do even more with the President," he said.
From CNN Politics
© 2012 Cable News Network. Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
| Advertising practices | Advertise with us | About us | Work for us | Help
He must have seen the gop walking around and it made him sick
It's stories like these that renew my faith in substantive journalism.
Trumka puked because he realized what an utterly right-wing corporatist Obama is and regrets having campaigned for a third term of GWB-style presidency!
Labor needs to stop supporting the Democratic Party, which hasn't supported real labor interests or populist economics in at least 30 years. Reaganomics isn't just for Republicans!
Nader/Trumka 2012
Must have been in a room full of Republicans. :-0
Thanks to the Obama administration we are not a country without a middle class. Breaks for only the rich and sending the poor to war to protect thier interest. I don't think that is the american way.
I feel the same way every time I think of Obama's policies and soaring debt numbers.
I'm glad you got sick pos
I have that same problem whenever I hear Obama speak.
No surprise there. I'd vomit too if I had to be in a meeting with Obama. He's enough to turn anyone's stomach.
MILLIONS OF JOBS CREATED OR SAVED? Where? Look at the unemploynent rate. The only thing this moron of a president has done was to slow down the natural recovery of the economy and to destroy the future of our country. What a mistake we made!!
Join the crowd.
I guess Trumka got a sneak peek of the REAL deficit projections.
They created No New Jobs today,now I am feeling sick.
got sick on all that socialism??????????? i know the feeling it turns my stomach too
Was the vomit green and did his head spin around backward? I ask because I'm pretty sure he's possessed.
Health care at its best.
Hope he feels better soon. Why IS this news, CNN?
Man cannot cover what God would reveal.
Feel better.
funny – these people even make themselves sick!
He was thinking of the consequences of Obama's economic and budget proposals. Now the White House smells like the policies created there.
I agree Trumka... yours and Øbama's policies make me sick too.
They're like cancer to a functioning economy... our economy has an Øbama stomach bug, too... it keeps vomiting up more and more lost jobs.
This story is making me sick
I feel like vomiting every time I think about Obama too!!
An evil plot by the GOP to poison him
Good, stay sick
I hope he didn't miss Obamas shoes.