US News

Obama supporter who told him she was ‘deeply disappointed’ because of his economic policies laid off

The Obama supporter who famously told the president during a televised town hall meeting that she was “deeply disappointed” in him has lost her job.

Velma Hart, who graced the front page of The Post in September after her direct questioning of the president, said today that she’s trying “focus on the positive and be optimistic.”

Hart was let go late last week as chief financial officer for AMVETS, a Maryland-based charity that aids veterans.

“They called me in on a Friday afternoon and said they had made a decision .¤.¤. we should make that cut,” she told CNBC.

The unwelcome news has made the married mother of two daughters even more aware of the dire state of the country’s economy.

“What’s in my heart now, even more than I did before, I appreciate what millions of people who are in my condition now have been experiencing for the last two, three, four years,” she told the network from her suburban Maryland home.

“Could it take me two years to find a job? Wow, that’s a scary proposition for me and my family,” she said.

Her two daughters are in private school and her eldest is preparing to enter college next year. Her husband, Karlton, is a facilities administrator of DC’s Verizon Center area.

Her boss, Jim King, said the decision was purely a financial one.

“It’s not anything she did,” he told The Washington Post.

“She got bit by the same snake that has bit a lot of people.

“It was a move to cut our bottom line,” said King, the nonprofit’s national executive director.

He added that her appearance on the CNBC town hall played no role in the decision to let her go.

“She was at the town hall as a private citizen,” he said.

“Whatever she had to say were her own thoughts.”

At the town hall meeting, she told Obama that she was, “exhausted “As I said before, times are tough for everybody. So, I understand your frustration.”

He then listed legislative achievements – such as more college scholarships and better consumer protection from credit card and mortgage companies – that could help Hart and her family.

She told CNBC today that she is still an Obama supporter and she may now look into his administration’s program to help homeowners adjust terms of their mortgages.

Despite the discouraging turn of events, she said that she’s trying to find reasons to stay hopeful “and assume that somehow things will work out.”

“I’m a data-driven person. The data says the economy’s getting better.”