By Steve Holland
WASHINGTON, Oct 30 (Reuters) - Former President Barack Obama and President Donald Trump are having a food fight in the closing days of the midterm election campaign, trading barbs over the Cheesecake Factory as voters prepare to decide control of Congress.
Obama struck a nerve with Trump by mocking his gold-heavy White House renovations, saying during an October 24 campaign stop in Ohio that the president had the place “looking like Saddam Hussein opened a Cheesecake Factory." Trump clapped back at Obama this week with lengthy defenses of both his renovations and the restaurant chain.
The restaurant flap is the latest offbeat detour in a campaign in which Trump has warned darkly about communism, commented on the physique of men's bodies and joked that the $5,000 payments he is promising Americans if Republicans keep Congress would barely cover a meal at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida.
Both men are trying to portray the other party as disconnected from voters' economic anxieties as Americans struggle with high prices, a central issue heading into Tuesday's election.
Campaigning for Democrats in Morrow, Georgia, on Wednesday, Obama said Trump and his followers were focusing on his Cheesecake Factory remarks instead of on inflation "and hope that you won't notice your bills are higher and your life is tougher."
“They mobilized a whole-of-government response to that joke, not to inflation, but to that joke," Obama said. "They don't have solutions to actual problems, so they'd rather have the media and you talking about the Cheesecake Factory."
Responding to conservative critics who suggested his joke mocked patrons of the restaurant chain, Obama said: "I am the father of two daughters. Do you think I could have survived their childhood without going to the Cheesecake Factory?"
Trump, never one to let a personal jibe go unanswered, seized on Obama's remarks during campaign stops in Texas and Mississippi.
"Every piece of lettuce he eats has to be perfect, and I'm not that choosy," Trump said in Corpus Christi, Texas, waving his arms around as if in the shape of a lettuce leaf.
Trump accused Obama of being elitist for mocking the restaurant chain, known for its multi-paged menu and an eclectic decor that can include Egyptian-style columns and palm trees, and dismissed complaints about his White House renovations.
“For you to say it’s a Cheesecake Factory, that just shows why you were a lousy president,” Trump taunted Obama in comments to reporters on Monday.
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent joined the fray on Tuesday, eating a French dip cheeseburger at the Cheesecake Factory in Washington and saying "the Martha's Vineyard set" should give the chain a try. Obama owns a home on the upscale Massachusetts island.
The episode is the latest flare-up in a rivalry that stretches back to 2011, when Trump gained political prominence by falsely accusing Obama of not being born in the US and Obama later mocked him in remarks at the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner.
During this year's midterm campaign, Democrats have accused Trump of being out of touch with everyday Americans' concerns, while Trump has repeatedly played down higher gas prices since the war with Iran began.
Trump provided his opponents another opening this week when he talked in Texas about how people should spend the $5,000 checks he has proposed sending to Americans if Republicans retain control of Congress.
“You could even come to Mar-a-Lago," Trump said. "The problem is that for $5,000 the most you’ll be able to buy is a hamburger and maybe a small dessert.”
(Reporting by Steve Holland; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Andrea Ricci )