Barack Obama received a rapturous ovation on Tuesday night when he celebrated never being indicted while president, in a clear dig at the perennially embattled Donald Trump.
The 44th President was guest of honour at Houston’s Baker Institute and reminisced about his time in office.
He said: “Not only did I not get indicted, nobody in my administration got indicted which by the way, is the only administration in modern history that can say that.
“In fact nobody got close to being indicted, partly because the people who joined us were there for the right reasons.”
Although he didn’t mention Trump by name, Obama appeared to be referencing the ever-increasing tally of indictments against former members of his administration and campaign team as a result of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation.
The current focus of the probe is Paul Manafort, who has pleaded guilty to a range of federal charges, from money laundering to unregistered lobbying.
Prosecutors for the Special Counsel said in a court filing on Monday that Manafort had lied to them, breaching a plea agreement.
Trump said on Wednesday he had not ruled out granting Manafort a pardon.
Obama was speaking in conversation with former Secretary of State James A. Baker III, who the institute was named after.
They covered topics such as the current state of the media and discussion of political life in the US, the issue of gerrymandering and the role of the United States in the contemporary world.
Obama said: “People ask me what surprised me most about the presidency. It is the degree to which the United States underwrites the international order.
“If there is a problem around the world, people do not call Moscow, they do not call Beijing. They call Washington. Even our adversaries expect us to solve problems and expect us to keep things running.
“When you start getting dysfunction in Washington which [makes it] difficult for decisions to get made and policymaking to run in an orderly process, what is one of our greatest assets – which is an extraordinary civil service, career staff, let’s say at the state department – when that begins to get undermined, that doesn’t just weaken our influence, it provides opportunities for disorder to start ramping up all around the world and ultimately makes us less safe and less prosperous.”