Obama: I Would Have Beaten Trump; Response from President-Elect

(Updated at 5:42 p.m.) In what is his strongest criticism of the campaign run by Hillary Clinton, President Obama said that the campaign made the mistake of playing it safe. At the same time, he said it's hard to blame her team given the circumstances.

"If you think you're winning, then you have a tendency, just like in sports, maybe to play it safer," Obama told David Axelrod, his former chief strategist in an interview for a podcast hosted by Axelrod.

Obama went on to say that Clinton "understandably looked and said, well, given my opponent and the things he's saying and what he's doing, we should focus on that."

Of course, it is a moot point since he was limited to only two terms in office.

A spokesman for the Clinton campaign declined to comment to The Washington Post.

Not surprisingly, President-elect Donald Trump took to Twitter to disagree, saying "no way" to Obama's assertion.

Obama told Axelrod that he was proud of the vision that he articulated, the coalition that he had put together.

"If I had run again and articulated (that vision), I think I could've mobilized a majority of the American people to rally behind it,” the president said.

He says that the Democrats need to do a better job "on the ground communicating not only the dry policy aspects of this, but that we care about these communities, that we're bleeding for these communities."

Obama says he believes that a lot of people who have worked for him over the past eight years will keep working to articulate that vision.

"This place never got cynical," he said. "We never had that fire snuffed out. There's a whole generation of people who worked in this administration who are going to keep on doing stuff in the future.

"The idealism and dedication stayed with the staff and got us through some really hard times."

Obama told Axelrod in the nearly one-hour interview that he is writing a book and that once he leaves office, he wants to continue being involved and "build that next generation of leadership."

Photo via White House/Flickr