Obama says he still views his job as uplifting the next generation of Democrats — as a former aide joked about the 'Silent Generation' leading the party

• "Pod Save America" co-host Jon Lovett joked with Obama about the age of the nation's leaders.
• Lovett quipped whether the next generation of leadership Obama talks about was "The Silent Generation.

Former President Barack Obama said that while Donald Trump's presidency may have distracted him, he remains focused on elevating the next generation of leaders within the Democratic Party.

It's a goal that one of Obama's former aides quipped is evermore urgent considering who is currently in command.

"One of the things you said since leaving office is that it's your job to kind of step back and allow a new generation of leaders to emerge," Jon Lovett, a former staffer, said during a "Pod Save America" interview Friday with Obama. "Did you intend on that to be the Silent Generation?"

Lovett's joke underlines the unprecedented moment America is experiencing as a mixture of an increase in life expectancy and the power of incumbency has led to the nation's oldest president and Congress in history.

Insider journalists spent months interviewing hundreds of sources and analyzing gigabytes of data to understand how the United States arrived at this moment, publishing its findings during September in the 30-part "Red, White, and Gray" series.

Obama, who was 47 when he became president in 2009, expounded on a number of topics during his interview with Lovett, Jon Favreau, Dan Pfeiffer, and Tommy Vietor, including why Democratic policies are oftentimes more popular than Democrats themselves.

But even the former president was stumped by why there is a generational "gap" in talent between Silent Generation-era leaders such as President Joe Biden, 79, and the younger elected officials in the US House and in statehouses.

Some of the elements of America's gerontocracy defy party lines as is evident by Senate Republicans being led by Mitch McConnell, who is 80 years old. That's around the same age as the three top Democratic leaders in the House — Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, and Whip James Clyburn — who are all in their early 80s.

"You know there's a gap between the talent that is coming up," Obama said. "A lot of them are 40 and under and then we have our national leadership that is …"

"Over 40," his aides chimed in as the former president appeared to be searching for a diplomatic way to describe the current situation.

Obama said the "good news" is that he sees a growing number of talented lawmakers, particularly in Congress. He declined to name specific officials, though.

"If you look at the talent that's in Congress right now, young dynamic folks who are willing to shake things up, it's really impressive," he said. "It's just gonna be a matter of them continuing on the path they're on and then making that leap where they start getting national attention."

As for the age gap's existence, Obama said people could speculate. One possible explanation is that as president, Obama presided over two disastrous midterms for his party that greatly depleted Democrat's bench to draw on for bigger races.

Obama told his former aides that Trump's actions meant that his post-presidency began in 2017 with him being more outspoken about contemporary political issues than he intended to be. Now, with his former vice president in the Oval Office, the 44th president said he can focus on the next generation of leaders.

"I was probably more active politically than I anticipated," Obama said. "But I thought the stakes were high enough during the four years my successor was in office that I was more vocal, and still tried to pick and choose my spots, I was more engaged and involved."

Lovett had one final question and joke for his former boss: Where is Gen X?

As Lovett noted, Gen X is underrepresented on the national stage. Insider explored this odd gap in detail, noting that Obama is not technically a Gen Xer, either.

"Why do you think Gen X didn't run? Do you think it was grunge? They just kind of sat the whole thing out, it's a little weird," Lovett said.

"It's a little weird," Obama said while chuckling. "There you go."