THE PRESIDENT VISITS DOWNTOWN MARQUETTE DINER
At 12:11 pm motorcade arrived at Donckers, a small, diner-like spot in downtown Marquette that advertises “CANDIES,” “Lunches” and “SODAS.”
Pool walked through the front door, past an elaborate array of candy in glass display cases. It was mostly empty. A sign hanging from the ceiling said, “Lunch Counter upstairs.” Pool headed upstairs, where a handful of people were eating lunch.
POTUS took a different entrance and emerged from a front room upstairs.
He shook hands with some of the diners and signed a couple paperback copies of his book, The Audacity of Hope.
“Everyone doing okay?” he said. He seemed to know one of the people there, asking a woman how the kids are doing and saying, “I haven’t seen him in a while.” Your pooler doesn’t know who he was referring to. But after learning that a couple of people there, including apparently the owner of Donckers, are Chicagoians, POTUS said, “You’re my homies.”
One woman told POTUS she’s teacher, and he told her to keep teaching. She pointed to another woman and said “we’re twins,” and POTUS told her he could tell.
POTUS inquired about Donckers Obama Burger. The woman behind the counter suggested a vegetarian option and POTUS told her he wasn’t going there.
Then he ordered a sandwich of some sort that he thought would not be as sloppy as the Obama Burger because, as he noted, he still has a speech to deliver.
The woman behind the counter showed him some dark and milk chocolate caramels.
“I’m going to have to get one of these,” POTUS said. “Nice, way to bribe me.”
Pool was ushered out after a few minutes and held in vans on Washington Street.
POTUS left at 12:36 pm, waving to cheering onlookers including a woman at a nearby beauty salon who was pressed up against the glass with highlight foils in her hair.
Carol Lee
POLITICO