When I first got to the White House, I was super anxious all the time about not knowing the answer to every question. And Obama was actually the person who let me be me. He was like, "Alyssa's not the person who wears the Ann Taylor suit. She's not the kind of person who always says the exact right thing." And I'm a bit of a wild animal. I brought a different perspective and I was a little bit more irreverent and casual.

Find someone who you really believe in - that can be at a state level. The one thing I can encourage women to do the most is to start at the state level.

When I had been dating my husband for a while, the president Obama said to me, "When is he going to put a ring on it?" And I was like, "Oh, come on. We are so busy. We don't need to think about that." He said, "He needs to put a ring on it because you're worth it." And the thing is, I'm not even kidding you, it was about a week or two later that we got engaged.

When you travel with the president, especially when you are traveling to foreign countries, the people that you travel with really become your family pretty quick. ... Most of the people who travel with me, they knew when I would get a stomachache.

I wanted young women to know that I was very lucky that I worked for people who literally let me be me. If I had ever been anyone other than me, I would have come off as a fake, a phony, a fraud, and never would have gotten where I ultimately ended up. You can be yourself and be in politics, and they should know that. That was kind of why I wanted to do it - because I didn't see any freaks in politics like me.

I'd love to say "Donald Trump is just sexist." And I do believe he's sexist, but I also believe that he also treats anyone who is his opponent in a very insane and disrespectful way.

I don't think that Donald Trump treated Hillary any differently than he treated Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio. He is a deeply disrespectful person who didn't have enough reverence for the office he was running for to act humane.