Oprah Winfrey Is Waiting on a Sign From God to Convince Her to Run for President

As much as you may want Oprah Winfrey to run for president of the United States, you’ll never be the one to convince her to throw her hat in the ring. That responsibility belongs to just one person—and it’s not her close friends (and former White House residents) Barack and Michelle Obama, longtime partner Stedman Graham, or even BFF Gayle King. In her cover story for this week’s issue of People, the media mogul reveals that she’s waiting for someone upstairs to tell her to run. “I went into prayer: ‘God, if you think I’m supposed to run, you gotta tell me, and it has to be so clear that not even I can miss it,'” she said. “And I haven’t gotten that.”

The calls for a President Oprah began earlier this year, when she gave an incredibly empowering speech while accepting the Cecil B. DeMille Award at the Golden Globe Awards in January. Though the inspiring address immediately prompted countless “#Oprah2020” tweets, Winfrey told People it wasn’t meant to be a stump speech. “When I walked off with Reese [Witherspoon], I thought, ‘I got that done,'” she said. “It wasn’t until I was back in the press room that they said, ‘Do you realize you’re trending?'” Since then, Winfrey said she’s been encouraged to run for president by close friends and strangers alike. “I had people—wealthy, billionaires—calling me up and saying, ‘I can get you a billion dollars. I can run your campaign,'” she shared. “That many people saying something made me think, ‘Am I at least supposed to look at the question?'”

But until she gets an obvious sign from above, Winfrey is perfectly content to continue her already life-changing work. “Nothing makes me happier than to see other people in their purest moments of joy,” said Winfrey, who has donated millions of dollars to charity and founded the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls to increase educational opportunities for young women in South Africa. “Sometimes, honest to goodness, I’m just sitting around thinking, ‘What could I do to make somebody feel really good today?'”

The 64-year-old has shot down the people’s presidential dreams for her several times since the Golden Globes. “I’ve always felt very secure and confident with myself in knowing what I could do and what I could not. And so it’s not something that interests me. I don’t have the DNA for it,” she previously told InStyle, prompting King to confirm, “I know, I know, I know! It wouldn’t be good for you—it would be good for everyone else.”

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