Remember When Donald Trump Said "I Really Like" President Obama in 2009?

Donald Trump has always been one to speak candidly, and in 2009, he had a few choice words about President Obama. Most of them, shockingly, were positive. "What he has done is amazing," Trump wrote in the first chapter of his 2009 book, Think Like A Champion, when retelling an interview he did for New York 1's Inside City Hall, BuzzFeed's political reporter Andrew Kaczynski reported.

Trump also wrote, "I told [Dominic Carter] that Barack will need to be a great president because we're in serious trouble in this country. It hasn't been this way since 1929. So he doesn't have much choice—he will simply have to be great, which he has a very good chance of doing."

Trump also praised Obama for winning the election:

He elaborated on that during his Larry King appearance in April 2009. "Well, I really like him," Trump told King. "I think that he's working very hard. He's trying to rebuild our reputation throughout the world. I mean, we really have lost a lot of reputation in the world."

He added, "And, you know, the world looks at us differently than they used to."

He called Obama someone with "a wonderful personality, a good speaker, somebody people trust." King asked the man who wrote a book on champions if he sees Obama as a one, and Trump said, "Oh, yes, he's a champion."

Read the full book and interview excerpts here. [via BuzzFeed]