Barack Obama
Official portrait, 2012

44th President of the United States
In office January 20, 2009 – January 20, 2017
Vice President	Joe Biden
Preceded by	George W. Bush
Succeeded by	Donald Trump
United States Senator from Illinois
In office January 3, 2005 – November 16, 2008
Preceded by	Peter Fitzgerald
Succeeded by	Roland Burris
Member of the Illinois Senate from the 13th district
In office January 8, 1997 – November 4, 2004
Preceded by	Alice Palmer
Succeeded by	Kwame Raoul

Personal details
Born	Barack Hussein Obama II (1961-08-04) August 4, 1961 (age 63) Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S.
Political party	Democratic
Spouse	Michelle Robinson (m. 1992)
Children	Malia Sasha
Parents	Barack Obama Sr. Ann Dunham
Relatives	Obama family
Education	Columbia University (BA) Harvard University (JD)
Occupation	Politician lawyer author
Awards	Full list
Signature
Website	Official website Obama Foundation White House Archives
Barack Obama's voice Obama on the death of Osama bin Laden Recorded May 2, 2011

Personal

Illinois State Senator and U.S. Senator from Illinois

44th President of the United States

Policies

Economy
Energy
Foreign policy
- Arctic
- Europe
- East Asia
- Middle East
- South Asia
- Obama Doctrine
Pardons
Marine
Native
Social
Space

Appointments

Presidential campaigns

2008
2012
- election
- primaries
- convention
- debates

Barack Hussein Obama II^[a] (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African-American president in American history. Obama previously served as a U.S. senator representing Illinois from 2005 to 2008 and as an Illinois state senator from 1997 to 2004.

Born in Honolulu, Hawaii, Obama graduated from Columbia University in 1983 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science and later worked as a community organizer in Chicago. In 1988, Obama enrolled in Harvard Law School, where he was the first black president of the Harvard Law Review. He became a civil rights attorney and an academic, teaching constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School from 1992 to 2004. In 1996, Obama was elected to represent the 13th district in the Illinois Senate, a position he held until 2004, when he successfully ran for the U.S. Senate. In the 2008 presidential election, after a close primary campaign against Hillary Clinton, he was nominated by the Democratic Party for president. Obama selected Joe Biden as his running mate and defeated Republican nominee John McCain and his running mate Sarah Palin.

Obama was awarded the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize for efforts in international diplomacy, a decision which drew both criticism and praise. During his first term, his administration responded to the 2008 financial crisis with measures including the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, a major stimulus package to guide the economy in recovering from the Great Recession; a partial extension of the Bush tax cuts; legislation to reform health care; and the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, a major financial regulation reform bill. Obama also appointed Supreme Court justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, the former being the first Hispanic American on the Supreme Court. He oversaw the end of the Iraq War and ordered Operation Neptune Spear, the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, who was responsible for the September 11 attacks. Obama downplayed Bush's counterinsurgency model, expanding air strikes and making extensive use of special forces, while encouraging greater reliance on host-government militaries. He also ordered the 2011 military intervention in Libya to implement United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973, contributing to the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi and the outbreak of the Libyan crisis.

Obama defeated Republican opponent Mitt Romney and his running mate Paul Ryan in the 2012 presidential election. In his second term, Obama advocated for gun control in the wake of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, took steps to combat climate change, signing the Paris Agreement, a major international climate agreement, and an executive order to limit carbon emissions. Obama also presided over the implementation of the Affordable Care Act and other legislation passed in his first term. He initiated sanctions against Russia following the invasion in Ukraine and again after Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. elections, ordered military intervention in Iraq in response to gains made by ISIL following the 2011 withdrawal from Iraq, negotiated the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (a nuclear agreement with Iran), and normalized relations with Cuba. The number of American soldiers in Afghanistan decreased during Obama's second term, though U.S. soldiers remained in the country throughout the remainder of his presidency. Obama promoted inclusion for LGBT Americans, becoming the first sitting U.S. president to publicly support same-sex marriage.

Obama left office in 2017 with high approval ratings both within the United States and among foreign advisories. He continues to reside in Washington D.C. and remains politically active, campaigning for candidates in various American elections, including in Biden's successful presidential bid in the 2020 presidential election. Outside of politics, Obama has published three books: Dreams from My Father (1995), The Audacity of Hope (2006), and A Promised Land (2020). His presidential library began construction in the South Side of Chicago in 2021. Historians and political scientists rank Obama among the upper tier in historical rankings of U.S. presidents.

Early life and career

[edit]

Barack Obama was born on August 4, 1961,^[2] at Kapiolani Medical Center for Women and Children in Honolulu, Hawaii.^[3]^[4]^[5]^[6] He is the only president born outside the contiguous 48 states.^[7] He was born to an 18-year-old American mother and a 27-year-old Kenyan father. His mother, Ann Dunham (1942–1995), was born in Wichita, Kansas, and was of English, Welsh, German, Swiss, and Irish descent. In 2007 it was discovered her great-great-grandfather Falmouth Kearney emigrated from the village of Moneygall, Ireland to the U.S. in 1850.^[8] In July 2012, Ancestry.com found a strong likelihood that Dunham was descended from John Punch, an enslaved African man who lived in the Colony of Virginia during the seventeenth century.^[9]^[10]^[11] Obama's father, Barack Obama Sr. (1934–1982),^[12] was a married^[13]^[14]^[15] Luo Kenyan from Nyang'oma Kogelo.^[13]^[16] His last name, Obama, was derived from his Luo descent.^[17] Obama's parents met in 1960 in a Russian language class at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, where his father was a foreign student on a scholarship.^[18]^[19] The couple married in Wailuku, Hawaii, on February 2, 1961, six months before Obama was born.^[20]^[21]

In late August 1961, a few weeks after he was born, Barack and his mother moved to the University of Washington in Seattle, where they lived for a year. During that time, Barack's father completed his undergraduate degree in economics in Hawaii, graduating in June 1962. He left to attend graduate school on a scholarship at Harvard University, where he earned a Master of Arts in economics. Obama's parents divorced in March 1964.^[22] Obama Sr. returned to Kenya in 1964, where he married for a third time and worked for the Kenyan government as the senior economic analyst in the Ministry of Finance.^[23]^{[page needed]} He visited his son in Hawaii only once, at Christmas 1971,^[24] before he was killed in an automobile accident in 1982, when Obama was 21 years old.^[25] Recalling his early childhood, Obama said: "That my father looked nothing like the people around me—that he was black as pitch, my mother white as milk—barely registered in my mind."^[19] He described his struggles as a young adult to reconcile social perceptions of his multiracial heritage.^[26]

In 1963, Dunham met Lolo Soetoro at the University of Hawaii; he was an Indonesian East–West Center graduate student in geography. The couple married on Molokai on March 15, 1965.^[27] After two one-year extensions of his J-1 visa, Lolo returned to Indonesia in 1966. His wife and stepson followed sixteen months later in 1967. The family initially lived in the Menteng Dalam neighborhood in the Tebet district of South Jakarta. From 1970, they lived in a wealthier neighborhood in the Menteng district of Central Jakarta.^[28]

Education

[edit]

At the age of 6, Obama and his mother had moved to Indonesia to join his stepfather. From age six to ten, he was registered in school as "Barry"^[29] and attended local Indonesian-language schools: Sekolah Dasar Katolik Santo Fransiskus Asisi (St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Elementary School) for two years and Sekolah Dasar Negeri Menteng 01 (State Elementary School Menteng 01) for one and a half years, supplemented by English-language Calvert School homeschooling by his mother.^[30]^[31] As a result of his four years in Jakarta, he was able to speak Indonesian fluently as a child.^[32] During his time in Indonesia, Obama's stepfather taught him to be resilient and gave him "a pretty hardheaded assessment of how the world works".^[33]

In 1971, Obama returned to Honolulu to live with his maternal grandparents, Madelyn and Stanley Dunham. He attended Punahou School—a private college preparatory school—with the aid of a scholarship from fifth grade until he graduated from high school in 1979.^[34] In high school, Obama continued to use the nickname "Barry" which he kept until making a visit to Kenya in 1980.^[35] Obama lived with his mother and half-sister, Maya Soetoro, in Hawaii for three years from 1972 to 1975 while his mother was a graduate student in anthropology at the University of Hawaii.^[36] Obama chose to stay in Hawaii when his mother and half-sister returned to Indonesia in 1975, so his mother could begin anthropology field work.^[37] His mother spent most of the next two decades in Indonesia, divorcing Lolo Soetoro in 1980 and earning a PhD degree in 1992, before dying in 1995 in Hawaii following unsuccessful treatment for ovarian and uterine cancer.^[38]

Of his years in Honolulu, Obama wrote: "The opportunity that Hawaii offered — to experience a variety of cultures in a climate of mutual respect — became an integral part of my world view, and a basis for the values that I hold most dear."^[39] Obama has also written and talked about using alcohol, marijuana, and cocaine during his teenage years to "push questions of who I was out of my mind".^[40] Obama was also a member of the "Choom Gang" (the slang term for smoking marijuana), a self-named group of friends who spent time together and smoked marijuana.^[41]^[42]

College and research jobs

After graduating from high school in 1979, Obama moved to Los Angeles to attend Occidental College on a full scholarship. In February 1981, Obama made his first public speech, calling for Occidental to participate in the disinvestment from South Africa in response to that nation's policy of apartheid.^[43] In mid-1981, Obama traveled to Indonesia to visit his mother and half-sister Maya and visited the families of college friends in Pakistan for three weeks.^[43] Later in 1981, he transferred to Columbia University in New York City as a junior, where he majored in political science with a specialty in international relations^[44] and in English literature^[45] and lived off-campus on West 109th Street.^[46] He graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1983 and a 3.7 GPA. After graduating, Obama worked for about a year at the Business International Corporation, where he was a financial researcher and writer,^[47]^[48] then as a project coordinator for the New York Public Interest Research Group on the City College of New York campus for three months in 1985.^[49]^[50]^[51]

Community organizer and Harvard Law School

Two years after graduating from Columbia, Obama moved from New York to Chicago when he was hired as director of the Developing Communities Project, a faith-based community organization originally comprising eight Catholic parishes in Roseland, West Pullman, and Riverdale on Chicago's South Side. He worked there as a community organizer from June 1985 to May 1988.^[50]^[52] He helped set up a job training program, a college preparatory tutoring program, and a tenants' rights organization in Altgeld Gardens.^[53] Obama also worked as a consultant and instructor for the Gamaliel Foundation, a community organizing institute.^[54] In mid-1988, he traveled for the first time in Europe for three weeks and then for five weeks in Kenya, where he met many of his paternal relatives for the first time.^[55]^[56]

External videos
Derrick Bell threatens to leave Harvard, April 24, 1990, 11:34, Boston TV Digital Archive^[57] Student Barack Obama introduces Professor Derrick Bell starting at 6:25.

Despite being offered a full scholarship to Northwestern University School of Law, Obama enrolled at Harvard Law School in the fall of 1988, living in nearby Somerville, Massachusetts.^[58] He was selected as an editor of the Harvard Law Review at the end of his first year,^[59] president of the journal in his second year,^[53]^[60] and research assistant to the constitutional scholar Laurence Tribe while at Harvard.^[61] During his summers, he returned to Chicago, where he worked as a summer associate at the law firms of Sidley Austin in 1989 and Hopkins & Sutter in 1990.^[62] Obama's election as the first black president of the Harvard Law Review gained national media attention^[53]^[60] and led to a publishing contract and advance for a book about race relations,^[63] which evolved into a personal memoir. The manuscript was published in mid-1995 as Dreams from My Father.^[63] Obama graduated from Harvard Law in 1991 with a Juris Doctor magna cum laude.^[64]^[59]

University of Chicago Law School

In 1991, Obama accepted a two-year position as Visiting Law and Government Fellow at the University of Chicago Law School to work on his first book.^[63]^[65] He then taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School for twelve years, first as a lecturer from 1992 to 1996, and then as a senior lecturer from 1996 to 2004.^[66]

From April to October 1992, Obama directed Illinois's Project Vote, a voter registration campaign with ten staffers and seven hundred volunteer registrars; it achieved its goal of registering 150,000 of 400,000 unregistered African Americans in the state, leading Crain's Chicago Business to name Obama to its 1993 list of "40 under Forty" powers to be.^[67]

Family and personal life

[edit]

In a 2006 interview, Obama highlighted the diversity of his extended family: "It's like a little mini-United Nations," he said. "I've got relatives who look like Bernie Mac, and I've got relatives who look like Margaret Thatcher."^[68] Obama has a half-sister with whom he was raised (Maya Soetoro-Ng) and seven other half-siblings from his Kenyan father's family, six of them living.^[69] Obama's mother was survived by her Kansas-born mother, Madelyn Dunham,^[70] until her death on November 2, 2008,^[71] two days before his election to the presidency. Obama also has roots in Ireland; he met with his Irish cousins in Moneygall in May 2011.^[72] In Dreams from My Father, Obama ties his mother's family history to possible Native American ancestors and distant relatives of Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War. He also shares distant ancestors in common with George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, among others.^[73]^[74]^[75]

Obama lived with anthropologist Sheila Miyoshi Jager while he was a community organizer in Chicago in the 1980s.^[76] He proposed to her twice, but both Jager and her parents turned him down.^[76]^[77] The relationship was not made public until May 2017, several months after his presidency had ended.^[77]

In June 1989, Obama met Michelle Robinson when he was employed at Sidley Austin.^[78] Robinson was assigned for three months as Obama's adviser at the firm, and she joined him at several group social functions but declined his initial requests to date.^[79] They began dating later that summer, became engaged in 1991, and were married on October 3, 1992.^[80] After suffering a miscarriage, Michelle underwent in vitro fertilization to conceive their children.^[81] The couple's first daughter, Malia Ann, was born in 1998,^[82] followed by a second daughter, Natasha ("Sasha"), in 2001.^[83] The Obama daughters attended the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools. When they moved to Washington, D.C., in January 2009, the girls started at the Sidwell Friends School.^[84] The Obamas had two Portuguese Water Dogs; the first, a male named Bo, was a gift from Senator Ted Kennedy.^[85] In 2013, Bo was joined by Sunny, a female.^[86] Bo died of cancer on May 8, 2021.^[87]

Obama is a supporter of the Chicago White Sox, and he threw out the first pitch at the 2005 ALCS when he was still a senator.^[88] In 2009, he threw out the ceremonial first pitch at the All-Star Game while wearing a White Sox jacket.^[89] He is also primarily a Chicago Bears football fan in the NFL, but in his childhood and adolescence was a fan of the Pittsburgh Steelers and rooted for them ahead of their victory in Super Bowl XLIII 12 days after he took office as president.^[90] In 2011, Obama invited the 1985 Chicago Bears to the White House; the team had not visited the White House after their Super Bowl win in 1986 due to the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster.^[91] He plays basketball, a sport he participated in as a member of his high school's varsity team,^[92] and he is left-handed.^[93]

In 2005, the Obama family applied the proceeds of a book deal and moved from a Hyde Park, Chicago condominium to a $1.6 million house (equivalent to $2.6 million in 2024) in neighboring Kenwood, Chicago.^[94] The purchase of an adjacent lot—and sale of part of it to Obama by the wife of developer, campaign donor and friend Tony Rezko—attracted media attention because of Rezko's subsequent indictment and conviction on political corruption charges that were unrelated to Obama.^[95]

In December 2007, Money Magazine estimated Obama's net worth at $1.3 million (equivalent to $2 million in 2024).^[96] Their 2009 tax return showed a household income of $5.5 million—up from about $4.2 million in 2007 and $1.6 million in 2005—mostly from sales of his books.^[97]^[98] On his 2010 income of $1.7 million, he gave 14 percent to non-profit organizations, including $131,000 to Fisher House Foundation, a charity assisting wounded veterans' families, allowing them to reside near where the veteran is receiving medical treatments.^[99]^[100] Per his 2012 financial disclosure, Obama may be worth as much as $10 million.^[101]

Religious views

[edit]

Obama is a Protestant Christian whose religious views developed in his adult life.^[102] He wrote in The Audacity of Hope that he "was not raised in a religious household." He described his mother, raised by non-religious parents, as being detached from religion, yet "in many ways the most spiritually awakened person ... I have ever known", and "a lonely witness for secular humanism." He described his father as a "confirmed atheist" by the time his parents met, and his stepfather as "a man who saw religion as not particularly useful." Obama explained how, through working with black churches as a community organizer while in his twenties, he came to understand "the power of the African-American religious tradition to spur social change."^[103]

In January 2008, Obama told Christianity Today: "I am a Christian, and I am a devout Christian. I believe in the redemptive death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. I believe that faith gives me a path to be cleansed of sin and have eternal life."^[104] On September 27, 2010, Obama released a statement commenting on his religious views, saying:

I'm a Christian by choice. My family didn't—frankly, they weren't folks who went to church every week. And my mother was one of the most spiritual people I knew, but she didn't raise me in the church. So I came to my Christian faith later in life, and it was because the precepts of Jesus Christ spoke to me in terms of the kind of life that I would want to lead—being my brothers' and sisters' keeper, treating others as they would treat me.^[105]^[106]

Obama met Trinity United Church of Christ pastor Jeremiah Wright in October 1987 and became a member of Trinity in 1992.^[107] During Obama's first presidential campaign in May 2008, he resigned from Trinity after some of Wright's statements were criticized.^[108] Since moving to Washington, D.C., in 2009, the Obama family has attended several Protestant churches, including Shiloh Baptist Church and St. John's Episcopal Church, as well as Evergreen Chapel at Camp David, but the members of the family do not attend church on a regular basis.^[109]^[110]^[111]

In 2016, Obama said that he gets inspiration from a few items that remind him "of all the different people I've met along the way", adding: "I carry these around all the time. I'm not that superstitious, so it's not like I think I necessarily have to have them on me at all times." The items, "a whole bowl full", include rosary beads given to him by Pope Francis, a figurine of the Hindu deity Hanuman, a Coptic cross from Ethiopia, a small Buddha statue given by a monk, and a metal poker chip that used to be the lucky charm of a motorcyclist in Iowa.^[112]^[113]

Legal career

[edit]

From 1994 to 2002, Obama served on the boards of directors of the Woods Fund of Chicago—which in 1985 had been the first foundation to fund the Developing Communities Project—and of the Joyce Foundation.^[50] He served on the board of directors of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge from 1995 to 2002, as founding president and chairman of the board of directors from 1995 to 1999.^[50] Obama's law license became inactive in 2007.^[114]^[115]

Legislative career

[edit]

Illinois Senate (1997–2004)

[edit]

Photo of Obama and others carrying a streetsign that reads "Honorary: Milton Davis Blvd." — State senator Obama and others celebrate the naming of a street in Chicago after ShoreBank co-founder Milton Davis in 1998

Obama was elected to the Illinois Senate in 1996, succeeding Democratic state senator Alice Palmer from Illinois's 13th District, which, at that time, spanned Chicago South Side neighborhoods from Hyde Park–Kenwood south to South Shore and west to Chicago Lawn.^[116] Once elected, Obama gained bipartisan support for legislation that reformed ethics and health care laws.^[117]^[118] He sponsored a law that increased tax credits for low-income workers, negotiated welfare reform, and promoted increased subsidies for childcare.^[119] In 2001, as co-chairman of the bipartisan Joint Committee on Administrative Rules, Obama supported Republican governor George Ryan's payday loan regulations and predatory mortgage lending regulations aimed at averting home foreclosures.^[120]^[121]

He was reelected to the Illinois Senate in 1998, defeating Republican Yesse Yehudah in the general election, and was re-elected again in 2002.^[122]^[123] In 2000, he lost a Democratic primary race for Illinois's 1st congressional district in the United States House of Representatives to four-term incumbent Bobby Rush by a margin of two to one.^[124]

In January 2003, Obama became chairman of the Illinois Senate's Health and Human Services Committee when Democrats, after a decade in the minority, regained a majority.^[125] He sponsored and led unanimous, bipartisan passage of legislation to monitor racial profiling by requiring police to record the race of drivers they detained, and legislation making Illinois the first state to mandate videotaping of homicide interrogations.^[119]^[126]^[127]^[128] During his 2004 general election campaign for the U.S. Senate, police representatives credited Obama for his active engagement with police organizations in enacting death penalty reforms.^[129] Obama resigned from the Illinois Senate in November 2004 following his election to the U.S. Senate.^[130]

2004 U.S. Senate campaign in Illinois

[edit]

In May 2002, Obama commissioned a poll to assess his prospects in a 2004 U.S. Senate race. He created a campaign committee, began raising funds, and lined up political media consultant David Axelrod by August 2002. Obama formally announced his candidacy in January 2003.^[131]

Obama was an early opponent of the George W. Bush administration's 2003 invasion of Iraq.^[132] On October 2, 2002, the day President Bush and Congress agreed on the joint resolution authorizing the Iraq War,^[133] Obama addressed the first high-profile Chicago anti-Iraq War rally,^[134] and spoke out against the war.^[135] He addressed another anti-war rally in March 2003 and told the crowd "it's not too late" to stop the war.^[136]

Decisions by Republican incumbent Peter Fitzgerald and his Democratic predecessor Carol Moseley Braun not to participate in the election resulted in wide-open Democratic and Republican primary contests involving 15 candidates.^[137] In the March 2004 primary election, Obama won in an unexpected landslide—which overnight made him a rising star within the national Democratic Party, started speculation about a presidential future, and led to the reissue of his memoir, Dreams from My Father.^[138] In July 2004, Obama delivered the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention,^[139] seen by nine million viewers. His speech was well received and elevated his status within the Democratic Party.^[140]

Obama's expected opponent in the general election, Republican primary winner Jack Ryan, withdrew from the race in June 2004.^[141] Six weeks later, Alan Keyes accepted the Republican nomination to replace Ryan.^[142] In the November 2004 general election, Obama won with 70 percent of the vote, the largest margin of victory for a Senate candidate in Illinois history.^[143] He took 92 of the state's 102 counties, including several where Democrats traditionally do not do well.^{[citation needed]}

U.S. Senate (2005–2008)

[edit]

Photo of Obama smiling with his arms crossed, with the Capitol building and the sky in the background — Official portrait of Obama as a member of the United States Senate

Obama was sworn in as a senator on January 3, 2005,^[144] becoming the only Senate member of the Congressional Black Caucus.^[145] He introduced two initiatives that bore his name: Lugar–Obama, which expanded the Nunn–Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction concept to conventional weapons;^[146] and the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006, which authorized the establishment of USAspending.gov, a web search engine on federal spending.^[147] On June 3, 2008, Senator Obama—along with Senators Tom Carper, Tom Coburn, and John McCain—introduced follow-up legislation: Strengthening Transparency and Accountability in Federal Spending Act of 2008.^[148] He also cosponsored the Secure America and Orderly Immigration Act.^[149]

In December 2006, President Bush signed into law the Democratic Republic of the Congo Relief, Security, and Democracy Promotion Act, marking the first federal legislation to be enacted with Obama as its primary sponsor.^[150]^[151] In January 2007, Obama and Senator Feingold introduced a corporate jet provision to the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act, which was signed into law in September 2007.^[152]^[153]

Later in 2007, Obama sponsored an amendment to the Defense Authorization Act to add safeguards for personality-disorder military discharges.^[154] This amendment passed the full Senate in the spring of 2008.^[155] He sponsored the Iran Sanctions Enabling Act supporting divestment of state pension funds from Iran's oil and gas industry, which was never enacted but later incorporated in the Comprehensive Iran Sanctions, Accountability, and Divestment Act of 2010;^[156] and co-sponsored legislation to reduce risks of nuclear terrorism.^[157] Obama also sponsored a Senate amendment to the State Children's Health Insurance Program, providing one year of job protection for family members caring for soldiers with combat-related injuries.^[158]

Obama held assignments on the Senate Committees for Foreign Relations, Environment and Public Works, and Veterans' Affairs through December 2006.^[159] In January 2007, he left the Environment and Public Works committee and took additional assignments with Health, Education, Labor and Pensions and Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.^[160] He also became Chairman of the Senate's subcommittee on European Affairs.^[161] As a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Obama made official trips to Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Central Asia, and Africa. He met with Mahmoud Abbas before Abbas became President of the Palestinian National Authority and gave a speech at the University of Nairobi in which he condemned corruption within the Kenyan government.^[162] Obama resigned his Senate seat on November 16, 2008, to focus on his transition period for the presidency.^[163]

Presidential campaigns

[edit]

2008

[edit]

Electoral college map, depicting Obama winning many states in the Northeast, Midwest, and Pacific West, and Florida, and McCain winning many states in the South and Rocky Mountains. — 2008 electoral vote results. Obama won 365–173.

On February 10, 2007, Obama announced his candidacy for President of the United States in front of the Old State Capitol building in Springfield, Illinois.^[164]^[165] The choice of the announcement site was viewed as symbolic, as it was also where Abraham Lincoln delivered his "House Divided" speech in 1858.^[164]^[166] Obama emphasized issues of rapidly ending the Iraq War, increasing energy independence, and reforming the health care system.^[167]

Numerous candidates entered the Democratic Party presidential primaries. The field narrowed to Obama and Senator Hillary Clinton after early contests, with the race remaining close throughout the primary process, but Obama gained a steady lead in pledged delegates due to better long-range planning, superior fundraising, dominant organizing in caucus states, and better exploitation of delegate allocation rules.^[168] On June 2, 2008, Obama had received enough votes to clinch his nomination. After an initial hesitation to concede, on June 7, Clinton ended her campaign and endorsed Obama.^[169] On August 23, 2008, Obama announced his selection of Delaware senator Joe Biden as his vice presidential running mate.^[170] Obama selected Biden from a field speculated to include former Indiana governor and senator Evan Bayh and Virginia governor Tim Kaine.^[170] At the Democratic National Convention in Denver, Colorado, Hillary Clinton called for her supporters to endorse Obama, and she and Bill Clinton gave convention speeches in his support.^[171]^[172] Obama delivered his acceptance speech at Invesco Field at Mile High stadium to a crowd of about eighty-four thousand; the speech was viewed by over three million people worldwide.^[173]^[174]^[175] During both the primary process and the general election, Obama's campaign set numerous fundraising records, particularly in the quantity of small donations.^[176] On June 19, 2008, Obama became the first major-party presidential candidate to turn down public financing in the general election since the system was created in 1976.^[177]

John McCain was nominated as the Republican candidate, and he selected Sarah Palin as his running mate. Obama and McCain engaged in three presidential debates in September and October 2008.^[178] On November 4, Obama won the presidency with 365 electoral votes to 173 received by McCain.^[179] Obama won 52.9 percent of the popular vote to McCain's 45.7 percent.^[180] He became the first African-American to be elected president.^[181] Obama delivered his victory speech before hundreds of thousands of supporters in Chicago's Grant Park.^[182]^[183] He is one of the three United States senators moved directly from the U.S. Senate to the White House, the others being Warren G. Harding and John F. Kennedy.^[184]

2012

[edit]

Electoral college map, depicting Obama winning many states in the Northeast, Midwest, and Pacific West, and Florida, and Romney winning many states in the South and Rocky Mountains. — 2012 electoral vote results. Obama won 332–206.

On April 4, 2011, Obama filed election papers with the Federal Election Commission and then announced his reelection campaign for 2012 in a video titled "It Begins with Us" that he posted on his website.^[185]^[186]^[187] As the incumbent president, he ran virtually unopposed in the Democratic Party presidential primaries,^[188] and on April 3, 2012, Obama secured the 2778 convention delegates needed to win the Democratic nomination.^[189] At the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina, Obama and Joe Biden were formally nominated by former president Bill Clinton as the Democratic Party candidates for president and vice president in the general election. Their main opponents were Republicans Mitt Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts, and Representative Paul Ryan of Wisconsin.^[190]

On November 6, 2012, Obama won 332 electoral votes, exceeding the 270 required for him to be reelected as president.^[191]^[192]^[193] With 51.1 percent of the popular vote,^[194] Obama became the first Democratic president since Franklin D. Roosevelt to win the majority of the popular vote twice.^[195]^[196] Obama addressed supporters and volunteers at Chicago's McCormick Place after his reelection and said: "Tonight you voted for action, not politics as usual. You elected us to focus on your jobs, not ours. And in the coming weeks and months, I am looking forward to reaching out and working with leaders of both parties."^[197]^[198]

Presidency (2009–2017)

[edit]

First 100 days

[edit]

The inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th president took place on January 20, 2009. In his first few days in office, Obama issued executive orders and presidential memoranda directing the U.S. military to develop plans to withdraw troops from Iraq.^[199] He ordered the closing of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp,^[200] but Congress prevented the closure by refusing to appropriate the required funds^[201]^[202] and preventing moving any Guantanamo detainee.^[203] Obama reduced the secrecy given to presidential records.^[204] He also revoked President George W. Bush's restoration of President Ronald Reagan's Mexico City policy which prohibited federal aid to international family planning organizations that perform or provide counseling about abortion.^[205]

Domestic policy

[edit]

The first bill signed into law by Obama was the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009, relaxing the statute of limitations for equal-pay lawsuits.^[206] Five days later, he signed the reauthorization of the State Children's Health Insurance Program to cover an additional four million uninsured children.^[207] In March 2009, Obama reversed a Bush-era policy that had limited funding of embryonic stem cell research and pledged to develop "strict guidelines" on the research.^[208]

Obama appointed two women to serve on the Supreme Court in the first two years of his presidency. He nominated Sonia Sotomayor on May 26, 2009, to replace retiring associate justice David Souter. She was confirmed on August 6, 2009,^[209] becoming the first Supreme Court Justice of Hispanic descent.^[210] Obama nominated Elena Kagan on May 10, 2010, to replace retiring Associate Justice John Paul Stevens. She was confirmed on August 5, 2010, bringing the number of women sitting simultaneously on the Court to three for the first time in American history.^[211]

On March 11, 2009, Obama created the White House Council on Women and Girls, which formed part of the Office of Intergovernmental Affairs, having been established by Executive Order 13506 with a broad mandate to advise him on issues relating to the welfare of American women and girls. The council was chaired by Senior Advisor to the President Valerie Jarrett. Obama also established the White House Task Force to Protect Students from Sexual Assault through a government memorandum on January 22, 2014, with a broad mandate to advise him on issues relating to sexual assault on college and university campuses throughout the United States. The co-chairs of the Task Force were Vice President Joe Biden and Jarrett. The Task Force was a development out of the White House Council on Women and Girls and Office of the Vice President of the United States, and prior to that the 1994 Violence Against Women Act first drafted by Biden.

In July 2009, Obama launched the Priority Enforcement Program, an immigration enforcement program that had been pioneered by George W. Bush, and the Secure Communities fingerprinting and immigration status data-sharing program.^[212]

In a major space policy speech in April 2010, Obama announced a planned change in direction at NASA, the U.S. space agency. He ended plans for a return of human spaceflight to the moon and development of the Ares I rocket, Ares V rocket and Constellation program, in favor of funding earth science projects, a new rocket type, research and development for an eventual crewed mission to Mars, and ongoing missions to the International Space Station.^[213]

On January 16, 2013, one month after the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, Obama signed 23 executive orders and outlined a series of sweeping proposals regarding gun control.^[214] He urged Congress to reintroduce an expired ban on military-style assault weapons, such as those used in several recent mass shootings, impose limits on ammunition magazines to 10 rounds, introduce background checks on all gun sales, pass a ban on possession and sale of armor-piercing bullets, introduce harsher penalties for gun-traffickers, especially unlicensed dealers who buy arms for criminals and approving the appointment of the head of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives for the first time since 2006.^[215] On January 5, 2016, Obama announced new executive actions extending background check requirements to more gun sellers.^[216] In a 2016 editorial in The New York Times, Obama compared the struggle for what he termed "common-sense gun reform" to women's suffrage and other civil rights movements in American history.

In 2011, Obama signed a four-year renewal of the Patriot Act.^[217] Following the 2013 global surveillance disclosures by whistleblower Edward Snowden, Obama condemned the leak as unpatriotic,^[218] but called for increased restrictions on the National Security Agency (NSA) to address violations of privacy.^[219]^[220] Obama continued and expanded surveillance programs set up by George W. Bush, while implementing some reforms.^[221] He supported legislation that would have limited the NSA's ability to collect phone records in bulk under a single program and supported bringing more transparency to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC).^[221]

Racial issues

[edit]

In his speeches as president, Obama did not make more overt references to race relations than his predecessors,^[222]^[223] but according to one study, he implemented stronger policy action on behalf of African-Americans than any president since the Nixon era.^[224]

Following Obama's election, many pondered the existence of a "post-racial America".^[225]^[226] However, lingering racial tensions quickly became apparent,^[225]^[227] and many African-Americans expressed outrage over what they saw as an intense racial animosity directed at Obama.^[228] The acquittal of George Zimmerman following the killing of Trayvon Martin sparked national outrage, leading to Obama giving a speech in which he said that "Trayvon Martin could have been me 35 years ago."^[229] The shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, sparked a wave of protests.^[230] These and other events led to the birth of the Black Lives Matter movement, which campaigns against violence and systemic racism toward black people.^[230] Though Obama entered office reluctant to talk about race, by 2014 he began openly discussing the disadvantages faced by many members of minority groups.^[231]

Several incidents during Obama's presidency generated disapproval from the African-American community and with law enforcement, and Obama sought to build trust between law enforcement officials and civil rights activists, with mixed results. Some in law enforcement criticized Obama's condemnation of racial bias after incidents in which police action led to the death of African-American men, while some racial justice activists criticized Obama's expressions of empathy for the police.^[232] In a March 2016 Gallup poll, nearly one third of Americans said they worried "a great deal" about race relations, a higher figure than in any previous Gallup poll since 2001.^[233]

LGBT rights

[edit]

On October 8, 2009, Obama signed the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, a measure that expanded the 1969 United States federal hate-crime law to include crimes motivated by a victim's actual or perceived gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability.^[234] On October 30, 2009, Obama lifted the ban on travel to the United States by those infected with HIV. The lifting of the ban was celebrated by Immigration Equality.^[235] On December 22, 2010, Obama signed the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act of 2010, which fulfilled a promise made in the 2008 presidential campaign^[236]^[237] to end the don't ask, don't tell policy of 1993 that had prevented gay and lesbian people from serving openly in the United States Armed Forces. In 2016, the Pentagon ended the policy that barred transgender people from serving openly in the military.^[238]

Same-sex marriage

[edit]

As a candidate for the Illinois state senate in 1996, Obama stated he favored legalizing same-sex marriage.^[239] During his Senate run in 2004, he said he supported civil unions and domestic partnerships for same-sex partners but opposed same-sex marriages.^[240] In 2008, he reaffirmed this position by stating "I believe marriage is between a man and a woman. I am not in favor of gay marriage."^[241] On May 9, 2012, shortly after the official launch of his campaign for re-election as president, Obama said his views had evolved, and he publicly affirmed his personal support for the legalization of same-sex marriage, becoming the first sitting U.S. president to do so.^[242]^[243] During his second inaugural address on January 21, 2013,^[198] Obama became the first U.S. president in office to call for full equality for gay Americans, and the first to mention gay rights or the word "gay" in an inaugural address.^[244]^[245] In 2013, the Obama administration filed briefs that urged the Supreme Court to rule in favor of same-sex couples in the cases of Hollingsworth v. Perry (regarding same-sex marriage)^[246] and United States v. Windsor (regarding the Defense of Marriage Act).^[247]

Economic policy

[edit]

On February 17, 2009, Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, a $787 billion (equivalent to $1153 billion in 2024) economic stimulus package aimed at helping the economy recover from the deepening worldwide recession.^[248] The act includes increased federal spending for health care, infrastructure, education, various tax breaks and incentives, and direct assistance to individuals.^[249] In March 2009, Obama's Treasury Secretary, Timothy Geithner, took further steps to manage the 2008 financial crisis, including introducing the Public–Private Investment Program for Legacy Assets, which contains provisions for buying up to $2 trillion in depreciated real estate assets.^[250]

Obama intervened in the troubled automotive industry^[251] in March 2009, renewing loans for General Motors (GM) and Chrysler to continue operations while reorganizing. Over the following months the White House set terms for both firms' bankruptcies, including the sale of Chrysler to Italian automaker Fiat^[252] and a reorganization of GM giving the U.S. government a temporary 60 percent equity stake in the company.^[253] In June 2009, dissatisfied with the pace of economic stimulus, Obama called on his cabinet to accelerate the investment.^[254] He signed into law the Car Allowance Rebate System, known colloquially as "Cash for Clunkers", which temporarily boosted the economy.^[255]^[256]^[257]

The Bush and Obama administrations authorized spending and loan guarantees from the Federal Reserve and the Department of the Treasury. These guarantees totaled about $11.5 trillion, but only $3 trillion had been spent by the end of November 2009.^[258] On August 2, 2011, after a lengthy congressional debate over whether to raise the nation's debt limit, Obama signed the bipartisan Budget Control Act of 2011. The legislation enforced limits on discretionary spending until 2021, established a procedure to increase the debt limit, created a Congressional Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction to propose further deficit reduction with a stated goal of achieving at least $1.5 trillion in budgetary savings over 10 years, and established automatic procedures for reducing spending by as much as $1.2 trillion if legislation originating with the new joint select committee did not achieve such savings.^[259] By passing the legislation, Congress was able to prevent a U.S. government default on its obligations.^[260]

The unemployment rate rose in 2009, reaching a peak in October at 10.0 percent and averaging 10.0 percent in the fourth quarter. Following a decrease to 9.7 percent in the first quarter of 2010, the unemployment rate fell to 9.6 percent in the second quarter, where it remained for the rest of the year.^[261] Between February and December 2010, employment rose by 0.8 percent, which was less than the average of 1.9 percent experienced during comparable periods in the past four employment recoveries.^[262] By November 2012, the unemployment rate fell to 7.7 percent,^[263] decreasing to 6.7 percent in the last month of 2013.^[264] During 2014, the unemployment rate continued to decline, falling to 6.3 percent in the first quarter.^[264] GDP growth returned in the third quarter of 2009, expanding at a rate of 1.6 percent, followed by a 5.0 percent increase in the fourth quarter.^[265] Growth continued in 2010, posting an increase of 3.7 percent in the first quarter, with lesser gains throughout the rest of the year.^[265] In July 2010, the Federal Reserve noted that economic activity continued to increase, but its pace had slowed, and chairman Ben Bernanke said the economic outlook was "unusually uncertain".^[266] Overall, the economy expanded at a rate of 2.9 percent in 2010.^[267]

U.S. unemployment rate and monthly changes in net employment during Obama's tenure as president^[264]^[268]

Job growth during the presidency of Obama compared to other presidents, as measured as a cumulative percentage change from month after inauguration to end of his term

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and a broad range of economists credit Obama's stimulus plan for economic growth.^[269]^[270] The CBO released a report stating that the stimulus bill increased employment by 1–2.1 million,^[270]^[271]^[272] while conceding that "it is impossible to determine how many of the reported jobs would have existed in the absence of the stimulus package."^[269] Although an April 2010, survey of members of the National Association for Business Economics showed an increase in job creation (over a similar January survey) for the first time in two years, 73 percent of 68 respondents believed the stimulus bill has had no impact on employment.^[273] The economy of the United States has grown faster than the other original NATO members by a wider margin under President Obama than it has anytime since the end of World War II.^[274] The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development credits the much faster growth in the United States to the stimulus plan of the U.S. and the austerity measures in the European Union.^[275]

Within a month of the 2010 midterm elections, Obama announced a compromise deal with the Congressional Republican leadership that included a temporary, two-year extension of the 2001 and 2003 income tax rates, a one-year payroll tax reduction, continuation of unemployment benefits, and a new rate and exemption amount for estate taxes.^[276] The compromise overcame opposition from some in both parties, and the resulting $858 billion (equivalent to $1.2 trillion in 2024) Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010 passed with bipartisan majorities in both houses of Congress before Obama signed it on December 17, 2010.^[277]

In December 2013, Obama declared that growing income inequality is a "defining challenge of our time" and called on Congress to bolster the safety net and raise wages. This came on the heels of the nationwide strikes of fast-food workers and Pope Francis' criticism of inequality and trickle-down economics.^[278] Obama urged Congress to ratify a 12-nation free trade pact called the Trans-Pacific Partnership.^[279]

Environmental policy

[edit]

Photo of Obama listening to a briefing, surrounded by senior staffers — Obama at a 2010 briefing on the BP oil spill at the Coast Guard Station Venice in Venice, Louisiana

On April 20, 2010, an explosion destroyed an offshore drilling rig at the Macondo Prospect in the Gulf of Mexico, causing a major sustained oil leak. Obama visited the Gulf, announced a federal investigation, and formed a bipartisan commission to recommend new safety standards, after a review by Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar and concurrent Congressional hearings. He then announced a six-month moratorium on new deepwater drilling permits and leases, pending regulatory review.^[280] As multiple efforts by BP failed, some in the media and public expressed confusion and criticism over various aspects of the incident, and stated a desire for more involvement by Obama and the federal government.^[281] Prior to the oil spill, on March 31, 2010, Obama ended a ban on oil and gas drilling along the majority of the East Coast of the United States and along the coast of northern Alaska in an effort to win support for an energy and climate bill and to reduce foreign imports of oil and gas.^[282]

In July 2013, Obama expressed reservations and said he "would reject the Keystone XL pipeline if it increased carbon pollution [or] greenhouse emissions."^[283]^[284] On February 24, 2015, Obama vetoed a bill that would have authorized the pipeline.^[285] It was the third veto of Obama's presidency and his first major veto.^[286]

In December 2016, Obama permanently banned new offshore oil and gas drilling in most United States-owned waters in the Atlantic and Arctic Oceans using the 1953 Outer Continental Shelf Act.^[287]^[288]^[289]

Obama emphasized the conservation of federal lands during his term in office. He used his power under the Antiquities Act to create 25 new national monuments during his presidency and expand four others, protecting a total of 553,000,000 acres (224,000,000 ha) of federal lands and waters, more than any other U.S. president.^[290]^[291]^[292]

Health care reform

[edit]

Obama called for Congress to pass legislation reforming health care in the United States, a key campaign promise and a top legislative goal.^[293] He proposed an expansion of health insurance coverage to cover the uninsured, cap premium increases, and allow people to retain their coverage when they leave or change jobs. His proposal was to spend $900 billion over ten years and include a government insurance plan, also known as the public option, to compete with the corporate insurance sector as a main component to lowering costs and improving quality of health care. It would also make it illegal for insurers to drop sick people or deny them coverage for pre-existing conditions, and require every American to carry health coverage. The plan also includes medical spending cuts and taxes on insurance companies that offer expensive plans.^[294]^[295]

On July 14, 2009, House Democratic leaders introduced a 1,017-page plan for overhauling the U.S. health care system, which Obama wanted Congress to approve by the end of 2009.^[293] After public debate during the Congressional summer recess of 2009, Obama delivered a speech to a joint session of Congress on September 9 where he addressed concerns over the proposals.^[297] In March 2009, Obama lifted a ban on using federal funds for stem cell research.^[298]

On November 7, 2009, a health care bill featuring the public option was passed in the House.^[299]^[300] On December 24, 2009, the Senate passed its own bill—without a public option—on a party-line vote of 60–39.^[301] On March 21, 2010, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA, colloquially "Obamacare") passed by the Senate in December was passed in the House by a vote of 219 to 212. Obama signed the bill into law on March 23, 2010.^[302]

The ACA includes health-related provisions, most of which took effect in 2014, including expanding Medicaid eligibility for people making up to 133 percent of the federal poverty level (FPL) starting in 2014,^[303] subsidizing insurance premiums for people making up to 400 percent of the FPL ($88,000 for family of four in 2010) so their maximum "out-of-pocket" payment for annual premiums will be from 2 percent to 9.5 percent of income,^[304] providing incentives for businesses to provide health care benefits, prohibiting denial of coverage and denial of claims based on pre-existing conditions, establishing health insurance exchanges, prohibiting annual coverage caps, and support for medical research. According to White House and CBO figures, the maximum share of income that enrollees would have to pay would vary depending on their income relative to the federal poverty level.^[305]

The costs of these provisions are offset by taxes, fees, and cost-saving measures, such as new Medicare taxes for those in high-income brackets, taxes on indoor tanning, cuts to the Medicare Advantage program in favor of traditional Medicare, and fees on medical devices and pharmaceutical companies;^[307] there is also a tax penalty for those who do not obtain health insurance, unless they are exempt due to low income or other reasons.^[308] In March 2010, the CBO estimated that the net effect of both laws will be a reduction in the federal deficit by $143 billion over the first decade.^[309]

The law faced several legal challenges, primarily based on the argument that an individual mandate requiring Americans to buy health insurance was unconstitutional. On June 28, 2012, the Supreme Court ruled by a 5–4 vote in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius that the mandate was constitutional under the U.S. Congress's taxing authority.^[310] In Burwell v. Hobby Lobby the Court ruled that "closely-held" for-profit corporations could be exempt on religious grounds under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act from regulations adopted under the ACA that would have required them to pay for insurance that covered certain contraceptives. In June 2015, the Court ruled 6–3 in King v. Burwell that subsidies to help individuals and families purchase health insurance were authorized for those doing so on both the federal exchange and state exchanges, not only those purchasing plans "established by the State", as the statute reads.^[311]

Foreign policy

[edit]

In February and March 2009, Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made separate overseas trips to announce a "new era" in U.S. foreign relations with Russia and Europe, using the terms "break" and "reset" to signal major changes from the policies of the preceding administration.^[312] Obama attempted to reach out to Arab leaders by granting his first interview to an Arab satellite TV network, Al Arabiya.^[313] On March 19, Obama continued his outreach to the Muslim world, releasing a New Year's video message to the people and government of Iran.^[314]^[315] On June 4, 2009, Obama delivered a speech at Cairo University in Egypt calling for "A New Beginning" in relations between the Islamic world and the United States and promoting Middle East peace.^[316] On June 26, 2009, Obama condemned the Iranian government's actions towards protesters following Iran's 2009 presidential election.^[317]

In 2011, Obama ordered a drone strike in Yemen which targeted and killed Anwar al-Awlaki, an American imam suspected of being a leading Al-Qaeda organizer. al-Awlaki became the first U.S. citizen to be targeted and killed by a U.S. drone strike. The Department of Justice released a memo justifying al-Awlaki's death as a lawful act of war,^[318] while civil liberties advocates described it as a violation of al-Awlaki's constitutional right to due process. The killing led to significant controversy.^[319] His teenage son and young daughter, also Americans, were later killed in separate U.S. military actions, although they were not targeted specifically.^[320]^[318]

In March 2015, Obama declared that he had authorized U.S. forces to provide logistical and intelligence support to the Saudis in their military intervention in Yemen, establishing a "Joint Planning Cell" with Saudi Arabia.^[321]^[322] In 2016, the Obama administration proposed a series of arms deals with Saudi Arabia worth $115 billion.^[323] Obama halted the sale of guided munition technology to Saudi Arabia after Saudi warplanes targeted a funeral in Yemen's capital Sanaa, killing more than 140 people.^[324]

In September 2016 Obama was snubbed by Xi Jinping and the Chinese Communist Party as he descended from Air Force One to the tarmac of Hangzhou International Airport for the 2016 G20 Hangzhou summit without the usual red carpet welcome.^[325]

War in Iraq

[edit]

On February 27, 2009, Obama announced that combat operations in Iraq would end within 18 months.^[326] The Obama administration scheduled the withdrawal of combat troops to be completed by August 2010, decreasing troop's levels from 142,000 while leaving a transitional force of about 50,000 in Iraq until the end of 2011. On August 19, 2010, the last U.S. combat brigade exited Iraq. Remaining troops transitioned from combat operations to counter-terrorism and the training, equipping, and advising of Iraqi security forces.^[327]^[328] On August 31, 2010, Obama announced that the United States combat mission in Iraq was over.^[329] On October 21, 2011, President Obama announced that all U.S. troops would leave Iraq in time to be "home for the holidays."^[330]

In June 2014, following the capture of Mosul by ISIL, Obama sent 275 troops to provide support and security for U.S. personnel and the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad. ISIS continued to gain ground and to commit widespread massacres and ethnic cleansing.^[331]^[332] In August 2014, during the Sinjar massacre, Obama ordered a campaign of U.S. airstrikes against ISIL.^[333] By the end of 2014, 3,100 American ground troops were committed to the conflict^[334] and 16,000 sorties were flown over the battlefield, primarily by U.S. Air Force and Navy pilots.^[335] In early 2015, with the addition of the "Panther Brigade" of the 82nd Airborne Division the number of U.S. ground troops in Iraq increased to 4,400,^[336] and by July American-led coalition air forces counted 44,000 sorties over the battlefield.^[337]

Afghanistan and Pakistan

[edit]

In his election campaign, Obama called the war in Iraq a "dangerous distraction" and that emphasis should instead be put on the war in Afghanistan,^[338] the region he cites as being most likely where an attack against the United States could be launched again.^[339] Early in his presidency, Obama moved to bolster U.S. troop strength in Afghanistan. He announced an increase in U.S. troop levels to 17,000 military personnel in February 2009 to "stabilize a deteriorating situation in Afghanistan", an area he said had not received the "strategic attention, direction and resources it urgently requires."^[340] He replaced the military commander in Afghanistan, General David D. McKiernan, with former Special Forces commander Lt. Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal in May 2009, indicating that McChrystal's Special Forces experience would facilitate the use of counterinsurgency tactics in the war.^[341] On December 1, 2009, Obama announced the deployment of an additional 30,000 military personnel to Afghanistan and proposed to begin troop withdrawals 18 months from that date;^[342] this took place in July 2011. David Petraeus replaced McChrystal in June 2010, after McChrystal's staff criticized White House personnel in a magazine article.^[343] In February 2013, Obama said the U.S. military would reduce the troop level in Afghanistan from 68,000 to 34,000 U.S. troops by February 2014.^[344] In October 2015, the White House announced a plan to keep U.S. Forces in Afghanistan indefinitely in light of the deteriorating security situation.^[345]

Regarding neighboring Pakistan, Obama called its tribal border region the "greatest threat" to the security of Afghanistan and Americans, saying that he "cannot tolerate a terrorist sanctuary." In the same speech, Obama claimed that the U.S. "cannot succeed in Afghanistan or secure our homeland unless we change our Pakistan policy."^[346]

Death of Osama bin Laden

[edit]

Starting with information received from Central Intelligence Agency operatives in July 2010, the CIA developed intelligence over the next several months that determined what they believed to be the hideout of Osama bin Laden. He was living in seclusion in a large compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, a suburban area 35 miles (56 km) from Islamabad.^[347] CIA head Leon Panetta reported this intelligence to President Obama in March 2011.^[347] Meeting with his national security advisers over the course of the next six weeks, Obama rejected a plan to bomb the compound, and authorized a "surgical raid" to be conducted by United States Navy SEALs.^[347] The operation took place on May 1, 2011, and resulted in the shooting death of bin Laden and the seizure of papers, computer drives and disks from the compound.^[348]^[349] DNA testing was one of five methods used to positively identify bin Laden's corpse,^[350] which was buried at sea several hours later.^[351] Within minutes of the President's announcement from Washington, DC, late in the evening on May 1, there were spontaneous celebrations around the country as crowds gathered outside the White House, and at New York City's Ground Zero and Times Square.^[348]^[352] Reaction to the announcement was positive across party lines, including from former presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.^[353]

Relations with Cuba

[edit]

Since the spring of 2013, secret meetings were conducted between the United States and Cuba in the neutral locations of Canada and Vatican City.^[354] The Vatican first became involved in 2013 when Pope Francis advised the U.S. and Cuba to exchange prisoners as a gesture of goodwill.^[355] On December 10, 2013, Cuban President Raúl Castro, in a significant public moment, greeted and shook hands with Obama at the Nelson Mandela memorial service in Johannesburg.^[356]

In December 2014, after the secret meetings, it was announced that Obama, with Pope Francis as an intermediary, had negotiated a restoration of relations with Cuba, after nearly sixty years of détente.^[357] Popularly dubbed the Cuban Thaw, The New Republic deemed the Cuban Thaw to be "Obama's finest foreign policy achievement."^[358] On July 1, 2015, President Obama announced that formal diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States would resume, and embassies would be opened in Washington and Havana.^[359] The countries' respective "interests sections" in one another's capitals were upgraded to embassies on July 20 and August 13, 2015, respectively.^[360] Obama visited Havana, Cuba for two days in March 2016, becoming the first sitting U.S. president to arrive since Calvin Coolidge in 1928.^[361]

Israel

[edit]

During the initial years of the Obama administration, the U.S. increased military cooperation with Israel, including increased military aid, re-establishment of the U.S.–Israeli Joint Political Military Group and the Defense Policy Advisory Group, and an increase in visits among high-level military officials of both countries.^[362] The Obama administration asked Congress to allocate money toward funding the Iron Dome program in response to the waves of Palestinian rocket attacks on Israel.^[363] In March 2010, Obama took a public stance against plans by the government of Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to continue building Jewish housing projects in predominantly Arab neighborhoods of East Jerusalem.^[364]^[365] In 2011, the United States vetoed a Security Council resolution condemning Israeli settlements, with the United States being the only nation to do so.^[366] Obama supports the two-state solution to the Arab–Israeli conflict based on the 1967 borders with land swaps.^[367]

In 2013, Jeffrey Goldberg reported that, in Obama's view, "with each new settlement announcement, Netanyahu is moving his country down a path toward near-total isolation."^[368] In 2014, Obama likened the Zionist movement to the civil rights movement in the United States. He said both movements seek to bring justice and equal rights to historically persecuted peoples, explaining: "To me, being pro-Israel and pro-Jewish is part and parcel with the values that I've been fighting for since I was politically conscious and started getting involved in politics."^[369] Obama expressed support for Israel's right to defend itself during the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict.^[370] In 2015, Obama was harshly criticized by Israel for advocating and signing the Iran Nuclear Deal; Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who had advocated the U.S. congress to oppose it, said the deal was "dangerous" and "bad."^[371]

On December 23, 2016, under the Obama administration, the United States abstained from United Nations Security Council Resolution 2334, which condemned Israeli settlement building in the occupied Palestinian territories as a violation of international law, effectively allowing it to pass.^[372] Netanyahu strongly criticized the Obama administration's actions,^[373]^[374] and the Israeli government withdrew its annual dues from the organization, which totaled $6 million, on January 6, 2017.^[375] On January 5, 2017, the United States House of Representatives voted 342–80 to condemn the UN Resolution.^[376]^[377]

Libya

[edit]

In February 2011, protests in Libya began against long-time dictator Muammar Gaddafi as part of the Arab Spring. They soon turned violent. In March, as forces loyal to Gaddafi advanced on rebels across Libya, calls for a no-fly zone came from around the world, including Europe, the Arab League, and a resolution^[378] passed unanimously by the U.S. Senate.^[379] In response to the passage of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973 on March 17, the Foreign Minister of Libya Moussa Koussa announced a ceasefire. However Gaddafi's forces continued to attack the rebels.^[380]

On March 19, a multinational coalition led by France and the United Kingdom with Italian and U.S. support, approved by Obama, took part in air strikes to destroy the Libyan government's air defense capabilities to protect civilians and enforce a no-fly-zone,^[381] including the use of Tomahawk missiles, B-2 Spirits, and fighter jets.^[382]^[383]^[384] Six days later, on March 25, by unanimous vote of all its 28 members, NATO took over leadership of the effort, dubbed Operation Unified Protector.^[385] Some members of Congress^[386] questioned whether Obama had the constitutional authority to order military action in addition to questioning its cost, structure and aftermath.^[387]^[388] In 2016 Obama said "Our coalition could have and should have done more to fill a vacuum left behind" and that it was "a mess".^[389] He has stated that the lack of preparation surrounding the days following the government's overthrow was the "worst mistake" of his presidency.^[390]

Syrian civil war

[edit]

On August 18, 2011, several months after the start of the Syrian civil war, Obama issued a written statement that said: "The time has come for President Assad to step aside."^[391] This stance was reaffirmed in November 2015.^[392] In 2012, Obama authorized multiple programs run by the CIA and the Pentagon to train anti-Assad rebels.^[393] The Pentagon-run program was later found to have failed and was formally abandoned in October 2015.^[394]^[395]

In the wake of a chemical weapons attack in Syria, formally blamed by the Obama administration on the Assad government, Obama chose not to enforce the "red line" he had pledged^[396] and, rather than authorize the promised military action against Assad, went along with the Russia-brokered deal that led to Assad giving up chemical weapons; however attacks with chlorine gas continued.^[397]^[398] In 2014, Obama authorized an air campaign aimed primarily at ISIL.^[399]

Iran nuclear talks

[edit]

On October 1, 2009, the Obama administration went ahead with a Bush administration program, increasing nuclear weapons production. The "Complex Modernization" initiative expanded two existing nuclear sites to produce new bomb parts. In November 2013, the Obama administration opened negotiations with Iran to prevent it from acquiring nuclear weapons, which included an interim agreement. Negotiations took two years with numerous delays, with a deal being announced on July 14, 2015. The deal titled the "Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action" saw sanctions removed in exchange for measures that would prevent Iran from producing nuclear weapons. While Obama hailed the agreement as being a step towards a more hopeful world, the deal drew strong criticism from Republican and conservative quarters, and from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.^[400]^[401]^[402] In addition, the transfer of $1.7 billion in cash to Iran shortly after the deal was announced was criticized by the Republican party. The Obama administration said that the payment in cash was because of the "effectiveness of U.S. and international sanctions."^[403] In order to advance the deal, the Obama administration shielded Hezbollah from the Drug Enforcement Administration's Project Cassandra investigation regarding drug smuggling and from the Central Intelligence Agency.^[404]^[405] On a side note, the very same year, in December 2015, Obama started a $348 billion worth program to back the biggest U.S. buildup of nuclear arms since Ronald Reagan left the White House.^[406]

Russia

[edit]

In March 2010, an agreement was reached with the administration of Russian President Dmitry Medvedev to replace the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty with a new pact reducing the number of long-range nuclear weapons in the arsenals of both countries by about a third.^[407] Obama and Medvedev signed the New START treaty in April 2010, and the U.S. Senate ratified it in December 2010.^[408] In December 2011, Obama instructed agencies to consider LGBT rights when issuing financial aid to foreign countries.^[409] In August 2013, he criticized Russia's law that discriminates against homosexual people,^[410] but he stopped short of advocating a boycott of the upcoming 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia.^[411]

After Russia's invasion of Crimea in 2014, military intervention in Syria in 2015, and the interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election,^[412] George Robertson, a former UK defense secretary and NATO secretary-general, said Obama had "allowed Putin to jump back on the world stage and test the resolve of the West", adding that the legacy of this disaster would last.^[413]

Cultural and political image

[edit]

Obama's family history, upbringing, and Ivy League education differ markedly from those of African-American politicians who rose to prominence in the 1960s through their involvement in the civil rights movement.^[414] Expressing puzzlement over questions about whether he is "black enough", Obama told an August 2007 meeting of the National Association of Black Journalists that "we're still locked in this notion that if you appeal to white folks then there must be something wrong."^[415] Obama acknowledged his youthful image in an October 2007 campaign speech, remarking: "I wouldn't be here if, time and again, the torch had not been passed to a new generation."^[416] Additionally, Obama has frequently been referred to as an exceptional orator.^[417] During his pre-inauguration transition period and continuing into his presidency, Obama delivered a series of weekly video addresses on YouTube.^[418]

Job approval

[edit]

According to the Gallup Organization, Obama began his presidency with a 68 percent approval rating,^[419] the fifth highest for a president following their swearing in.^[420] His ratings remained above the majority level until November 2009^[421] and by August 2010 his approval was in the low 40s,^[422] a trend similar to Ronald Reagan's and Bill Clinton's first years in office.^[423] Following the death of Osama bin Laden on May 2, 2011, Obama experienced a small poll bounce and steadily maintained 50–53 percent approval for about a month, until his approval numbers dropped back to the low 40s.^[424]^[425]^[426]

His approval rating fell to 38 percent on several occasions in late 2011^[427] before recovering in mid-2012 with polls showing an average approval of 50 percent.^[428] After his second inauguration in 2013, Obama's approval ratings remained stable around 52 percent^[429] before declining for the rest of the year and eventually bottoming out at 39 percent in December.^[424] In polling conducted before the 2014 midterm elections, Obama's approval ratings were at their lowest^[430]^[431] with his disapproval rating reaching a high of 57 percent.^[424]^[432]^[433] His approval rating continued to lag throughout most of 2015 but began to reach the high 40s by the end of the year.^[424]^[434] According to Gallup, Obama's approval rating reached 50 percent in March 2016, a level unseen since May 2013.^[424]^[435] In polling conducted January 16–19, 2017, Obama's final approval rating was 59 percent, which placed him on par with George H. W. Bush and Dwight D. Eisenhower, whose final Gallup ratings also measured in the high 50s.^[436]

Obama has maintained relatively positive public perceptions after his presidency.^[437] In Gallup's retrospective approval polls of former presidents, Obama garnered a 63 percent approval rating in 2018 and again in 2023, ranking him the fourth most popular president since World War II.^[438]^[439]

Foreign perceptions

[edit]

Polls showed strong support for Obama in other countries both before and during his presidency.^[440]^[441]^[442] In a February 2009 poll conducted in Western Europe and the U.S. by Harris Interactive for France 24 and the International Herald Tribune, Obama was rated as the most respected world leader, as well as the most powerful.^[443] In a similar poll conducted by Harris in May 2009, Obama was rated as the most popular world leader, as well as the one figure most people would pin their hopes on for pulling the world out of the economic downturn.^[444]^[445]

On October 9, 2009—only nine months into his first term—the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced that Obama had won the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize "for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples",^[446] which drew a mixture of praise and criticism from world leaders and media figures.^[447]^[448]^[449]^[450] He became the fourth U.S. president to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, and the third to become a Nobel laureate while in office.^[451] He himself called it a "call to action" and remarked: "I do not view it as a recognition of my own accomplishments but rather an affirmation of American leadership on behalf of aspirations held by people in all nations".^[452]

Thanks, Obama

[edit]

In 2009, the saying "thanks, Obama" first appeared in a Twitter hashtag, "#thanks Obama", and was later used in a demotivational poster. It was later adopted satirically to blame Obama for any socio-economic ills. Obama himself used the phrase in video in 2015 and 2016. In 2017, the phrase was used by Stephen Colbert to express gratitude to Obama on his last day in office. In 2022, President Joe Biden's Twitter account posted the phrase.

Post-presidency (2017–present)

[edit]

Obama's presidency ended on January 20, 2017, upon the inauguration of his successor, Donald Trump.^[453]^[454] The family moved to a house they rented in Kalorama, Washington, D.C.^[455] On March 2, the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum awarded the Profile in Courage Award to Obama "for his enduring commitment to democratic ideals and elevating the standard of political courage."^[456] His first public appearance since leaving the office was a seminar at the University of Chicago on April 24, where he appealed for a new generation to participate in politics.^[457] On September 7, Obama partnered with former presidents Jimmy Carter, George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush to work with One America Appeal to help the victims of Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma in the Gulf Coast and Texas communities.^[458] From October 31 to November 1, Obama hosted the inaugural summit of the Obama Foundation,^[459] which he intended to be the central focus of his post-presidency and part of his ambitions for his subsequent activities following his presidency to be more consequential than his time in office.^[460]

Barack and Michelle Obama signed a deal on May 22, 2018, to produce docu-series, documentaries and features for Netflix under the Obamas' newly formed production company, Higher Ground Productions.^[461]^[462] Higher Ground's first film, American Factory, won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature in 2020.^[463] On October 24, a pipe bomb addressed to Obama was intercepted by the Secret Service. It was one of several pipe-bombs that had been mailed out to Democratic lawmakers and officials.^[464] In 2019, Barack and Michelle Obama bought a home on Martha's Vineyard from Wyc Grousbeck.^[465] On October 29, Obama criticized "wokeness" and call-out culture at the Obama Foundation's annual summit.^[466]^[467]

Obama was reluctant to make an endorsement in the 2020 Democratic presidential primaries because he wanted to position himself to unify the party, regardless of the nominee.^[468] On April 14, 2020, Obama endorsed Biden, the presumptive nominee, for president in the presidential election, stating that he has "all the qualities we need in a president right now."^[469]^[470] In May, Obama criticized President Trump for his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, calling his response to the crisis "an absolute chaotic disaster", and stating that the consequences of the Trump presidency have been "our worst impulses unleashed, our proud reputation around the world badly diminished, and our democratic institutions threatened like never before."^[471] On November 17, Obama's presidential memoir, A Promised Land, was released.^[472]^[473]^[474]

In February 2021, Obama and musician Bruce Springsteen started a podcast called Renegades: Born in the USA where the two talk about "their backgrounds, music and their 'enduring love of America.'"^[475]^[476] Later that year, Regina Hicks had signed a deal with Netflix, in a venture with his and Michelle's Higher Ground to develop comedy projects.^[477]

On March 4, 2022, Obama won an Audio Publishers Association (APA) Award in the best narration by the author category for the narration of his memoir A Promised Land.^[478] On April 5, Obama visited the White House for the first time since leaving office, in an event celebrating the 12th annual anniversary of the signing of the Affordable Care Act.^[479]^[480]^[481] In June, it was announced that the Obamas and their podcast production company, Higher Ground, signed a multi-year deal with Audible.^[482]^[483] In September, Obama visited the White House to unveil his and Michelle's official White House portraits.^[484] Around the same time, he won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Narrator^[485] for his narration in the Netflix documentary series Our Great National Parks.^[486]

In 2022, Obama opposed expanding the Supreme Court beyond the present nine Justices.^[487]

In March 2023, Obama traveled to Australia as a part of his speaking tour of the country. During the trip, Obama met with Australian prime minister Anthony Albanese and visited Melbourne for the first time.^[488] Obama was reportedly paid more than $1 million for two speeches.^[489]^[490]

In October 2023, during the Gaza war, Obama declared that Israel must dismantle Hamas in the wake of the Hamas-led attack on Israel.^[491] Weeks later, Obama warned Israel that its actions could "harden Palestinian attitudes for generations" and weaken international support for Israel; any military strategy that ignored the war's human costs "could ultimately backfire."^[492]

In July 2024, Obama expressed concerns about Biden's campaign viability after his critically maligned debate performance against former president Trump.^[493] On July 21, Biden withdrew his candidacy and swiftly endorsed Vice President Harris right after to run as the Democratic nominee. Obama endorsed Harris alongside his wife Michelle five days later and delivered a speech at the 2024 Democratic National Convention formally endorsing her.^[494] He joined Harris on the campaign trail in October, traveling to various swing states and emphasizing her record as a prosecutor, senator, and vice president and advocating for increased voter turnout, and his criticisms of Donald Trump and the Republican Party were widely reported by various media outlets.^[495]^[496] After Trump was declared the winner of the election on November 6, Obama and Michelle congratulated him and Vice President–elect JD Vance while praising the Harris campaign and calling on liberal voters to continue supporting democracy and human rights.^[497]

Legacy and recognition

[edit]

Obama has been described as one of the most effective campaigners in American history (his 2008 campaign being particularly highlighted) as well as one of the most talented political orators of the 21st century.^[498]^[499]^[500] Historian Julian Zelizer credits Obama with "a keen sense of how the institutions of government work and the ways that his team could design policy proposals." Zeitzer notes Obama's policy successes included the economic stimulus package which ended the Great Recession and the Dodd-Frank financial and consumer protection reforms, as well as the Affordable Care Act. Zeitzer also notes the Democratic Party lost power and numbers of elected officials during Obama's term, saying that the consensus among historians is that Obama "turned out to be a very effective policymaker but not a tremendously successful party builder." Zeitzer calls this the "defining paradox of Obama's presidency".^[501]

The Brookings Institution noted that Obama passed "only one major legislative achievement (Obamacare)—and a fragile one at that—the legacy of Obama's presidency mainly rests on its tremendous symbolic importance and the fate of a patchwork of executive actions."^[502] David W. Wise noted that Obama fell short "in areas many Progressives hold dear", including the continuation of drone strikes, not going after big banks during the Great Recession, and failing to strengthen his coalition before pushing for Obamacare. Wise called Obama's legacy that of "a disappointingly conventional president".^[503]

Obama's most significant accomplishment is generally considered to be the Affordable Care Act (ACA), provisions of which went into effect from 2010 to 2020. Many attempts by Senate Republicans to repeal the ACA, including a "skinny repeal", have thus far failed.^[504] However, in 2017, the penalty for violating the individual mandate was repealed effective 2019.^[505] Together with the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act amendment, it represents the U.S. healthcare system's most significant regulatory overhaul and expansion of coverage since the passage of Medicare and Medicaid in 1965.^[506]^[507]^[508]^[509]

Many commentators credit Obama with averting a threatened depression and pulling the economy back from the Great Recession.^[504] According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Obama administration created 11.3 million jobs from the month after his first inauguration to the end of his second term.^[510] In 2010, Obama signed into effect the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. Passed as a response to the 2008 financial crisis, it brought the most significant changes to financial regulation in the United States since the regulatory reform that followed the Great Depression under Democratic President Franklin D. Roosevelt.^[511]

In 2009, Obama signed into law the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010, which contained in it the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, the first addition to existing federal hate crime law in the United States since Democratic President Bill Clinton signed into law the Church Arson Prevention Act of 1996. The act expanded existing federal hate crime laws in the United States, and made it a federal crime to assault people based on sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability.^[512]

As president, Obama advanced LGBT rights.^[513] In 2010, he signed the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act, which brought an end to "don't ask, don't tell" policy in the U.S. armed forces that banned open service from LGBT people; the law went into effect the following year.^[514] In 2016, his administration brought an end to the ban on transgender people serving openly in the U.S. armed forces.^[515]^[238] A Gallup poll, taken in the final days of Obama's term, showed that 68 percent of Americans believed the U.S. had made progress on LGBT rights during Obama's eight years in office.^[516]

Obama substantially escalated the use of drone strikes against suspected militants and terrorists associated with al-Qaeda and the Taliban.^[517] In 2016, the last year of his presidency, the U.S. dropped 26,171 bombs on seven different countries.^[518]^[519] Obama left about 8,400 U.S. troops in Afghanistan, 5,262 in Iraq, 503 in Syria, 133 in Pakistan, 106 in Somalia, seven in Yemen, and two in Libya at the end of his presidency.^[520]

According to Pew Research Center and United States Bureau of Justice Statistics, from December 31, 2009, to December 31, 2015, inmates sentenced in U.S. federal custody declined by five percent. This is the largest decline in sentenced inmates in U.S. federal custody since Democratic president Jimmy Carter. By contrast, the federal prison population increased significantly under presidents Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush.^[521]

Human Rights Watch (HRW) called Obama's human rights record "mixed", adding that "he has often treated human rights as a secondary interest—nice to support when the cost was not too high, but nothing like a top priority he championed."^[221]

Obama left office in January 2017 with a 60 percent approval rating.^[522]^[523] He gained 10 spots from the same survey in 2015 from the Brookings Institution that ranked him the 18th-greatest American president.^[524] In Gallup's 2018 job approval poll for the past 10 U.S. presidents, he received a 63 percent approval rating.^[438]

Presidential library

[edit]

The Barack Obama Presidential Center is Obama's planned presidential library. It will be hosted by the University of Chicago and located in Jackson Park on the South Side of Chicago.^[525]

Awards and honors

[edit]

Obama received the Norwegian Nobel Committee's Nobel Peace Prize in 2009, The Shoah Foundation Institute for Visual History and Education's Ambassador of Humanity Award in 2014, the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award in 2017, and the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights Ripple of Hope Award in 2018. He was named TIME Magazine's Time Person of the Year in 2008 and 2012. He also received two Grammy Awards for Best Spoken Word Album for Dreams from My Father (2006), and The Audacity of Hope (2008) as well as two Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Narrator for Our Great National Parks (2022), and Working: What We Do All Day (2023). He also won two Children's and Family Emmy Awards.

Eponymy

[edit]

Bibliography

[edit]

Books

[edit]

Obama, Barack (1995). Dreams from My Father. New York: Times Books. ISBN 978-0-8129-2343-8.
——————— (2006). The Audacity of Hope. New York: Crown Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-307-23769-9.
——————— (2010). Of Thee I Sing. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. ISBN 978-0-375-83527-8.
——————— (2020). A Promised Land. New York: Crown Publishing Group. ISBN 978-1-5247-6316-9.^[526]

Audiobooks

[edit]

2006: The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream (read by the author), Random House Audio, ISBN 978-0-7393-6641-7
2020: A Promised Land (read by the author)

Articles

[edit]

Obama, Barack (1988). "Why organize? Problems in the inner city". Illinois Issues. XIV (8 & 9): 40–42. ISSN 0738-9663.
——————— (1990). "Tort Law. Prenatal Injuries. Supreme Court of Illinois Refuses to Recognize Cause of Action Brought by Fetus Against Its Mother for Unintentional Infliction of Prenatal Injuries. Stallman v. Youngquist, 125 Ill. 2d 267, 531 N. E.2d 355 (1988)". Harvard Law Review. 103 (3): 823–828. doi:10.2307/1341352. JSTOR 1341352. Uncredited case comment.^[527]
——————— (2005). "Bound to the Word". American Libraries. 36 (7): 48–52. JSTOR 25649652.
———————; Clinton, Hillary (May 25, 2006). "Making Patient Safety the Centerpiece of Medical Liability Reform". The New England Journal of Medicine. 354 (21): 2205–2208. doi:10.1056/NEJMp068100. PMID 16723612.
——————— (2007). "Renewing American Leadership". Foreign Affairs. 86 (4): 2–16. JSTOR 20032411.
——————— (2008). "A More Perfect Union". The Black Scholar. 38 (1): 17–23. doi:10.1080/00064246.2008.11413431. JSTOR 41069296. S2CID 219318643.
——————— (2009). "What Science Can Do". Issues in Science and Technology. 25 (4): 23–30. JSTOR 43314908.
——————— (2009). "A New Beginning". Zeitschrift für Staats- und Europawissenschaften. 7 (2): 173–186. doi:10.5771/1610-7780-2009-2-173. JSTOR 26165626.
——————— (August 2, 2016). "United States Health Care Reform: Progress to Date and Next Steps". Journal of the American Medical Association. 130 (5): 811–866. doi:10.1001/jama.2016.9797. PMC 5069435. PMID 27400401.
——————— (January 5, 2017). "The President's Role in Advancing Criminal Justice Reform" (PDF). Harvard Law Review. 130 (3): 811–866. JSTOR 44865604.
——————— (January 13, 2017). "The Irreversible Momentum of Clean Energy". Science. 355 (6321): 126–129. Bibcode:2017Sci...355..126O. doi:10.1126/science.aam6284. PMID 28069665. S2CID 30991274.
——————— (May 2017). "Repealing the ACA Without a Replacement—the Risks to American Health Care". Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 72 (5): 263–264. doi:10.1097/OGX.0000000000000447. S2CID 80088566.

See also

[edit]

Notes

[edit]

^ Pronounced /bəˈrɑːk huːˈseɪn oʊˈbɑːmə/ ^ⓘ, bə-RAHK hoo-SAYN oh-BAH-mə^[1]

References

[edit]

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^ Maraniss, David (August 24, 2008). "Though Obama had to leave to find himself, it is Hawaii that made his rise possible". The Washington Post. p. A22. Archived from the original on March 28, 2019. Retrieved October 28, 2008.
^ Nakaso, Dan (December 22, 2008). "Twin sisters, Obama on parallel paths for years". The Honolulu Advertiser. p. B1. Archived from the original on January 29, 2011. Retrieved January 22, 2011.
^ Barreto, Amílcar Antonio; O'Bryant, Richard L. (November 12, 2013). "Introduction". American Identity in the Age of Obama. Taylor & Francis. pp. 18–19. ISBN 978-1-317-93715-9. Retrieved May 8, 2017.
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^ ^a ^b Jacobs, Sally (2011b). "President Obama's Father: A 'Bold And Reckless Life'". NPR. Archived from the original on December 23, 2019. Retrieved January 16, 2020.
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Obama 2004, pp. 9–10
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Scott 2011, p. 86
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^ Obama 2004.
^
Scott 2011, pp. 142–144
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^
Ochieng, Philip (November 1, 2004). "From home squared to the US Senate: how Barack Obama was lost and found". The EastAfrican. Nairobi. Archived from the original on September 27, 2007.
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^
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^
Scott 2011, pp. 97–103
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^ ^a ^b Suhartono, Anton (March 19, 2010). "Sekolah di SD Asisi, Obama Berstatus Agama Islam". Okezone (in Indonesian). Archived from the original on January 28, 2021. Retrieved January 21, 2021.
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^ "Barack Obama: Calvert Homeschooler?—Calvert Education Blog". calverteducation.com. January 25, 2014. Archived from the original on March 13, 2017. Retrieved November 25, 2015.
^
Zimmer, Benjamin (2009). "Obama's Indonesian Redux". Language Log. Archived from the original on March 3, 2009. Retrieved March 12, 2009.
- "Obama: Saya Kangen Nasi Goreng, Bakso, dan Rambutan". Kompas (in Indonesian). November 26, 2008. Archived from the original on December 3, 2008.
^ Meacham, Jon (August 22, 2008). "What Barack Obama Learned from His Father". Newsweek. Archived from the original on January 7, 2017. Retrieved January 9, 2017.
^
Serafin, Peter (March 21, 2004). "Punahou grad stirs up Illinois politics". Honolulu Star-Bulletin. Archived from the original on March 28, 2019. Retrieved March 20, 2008.
- Scott, Janny (March 14, 2008). "A free-spirited wanderer who set Obama's path". The New York Times. p. A1. Archived from the original on March 14, 2008. Retrieved November 18, 2011.
- Obama 2004, chapters 3 and 4
- Scott 2011, pp. 131–134
- Maraniss 2012, pp. 264–269
^ Wolffe, Richard (March 22, 2008). "When Barry Became Barack". Newsweek. Archived from the original on April 18, 2010. Retrieved March 21, 2016.
^
Scott 2011, pp. 139–157
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Scott 2011, pp. 157–194
- Maraniss 2012, pp. 279–281, 324–326
^ Scott 2011, pp. 214, 294, 317–346.
^ Reyes, B.J. (February 8, 2007). "Punahou left lasting impression on Obama". Honolulu Star-Bulletin. Archived from the original on March 28, 2019. Retrieved February 10, 2007. As a teenager, Obama went to parties and sometimes sought out gatherings on military bases or at the University of Hawaii that were attended mostly by blacks.
^ Elliott, Philip (November 21, 2007). "Obama gets blunt with N.H. students". The Boston Globe. Associated Press. p. 8A. Archived from the original on April 7, 2012. Retrieved May 18, 2012.
^
Karl, Jonathan (May 25, 2012). "Obama and His Pot-Smoking 'Choom Gang'". ABC News. Archived from the original on May 25, 2012. Retrieved May 25, 2012.
- Obama 2004, pp. 93–94
- Maraniss 2012, pp. 293–97, 299, 302, 306, 315, 317, 319, 365, 452, 515
- for analysis of the political impact of the quote and Obama's more recent admission that he smoked marijuana as a teenager ("When I was a kid, I inhaled"), see:
- Seelye, Katharine Q. (October 24, 2006). "Obama offers more variations from the norm". The New York Times. p. A21. Archived from the original on May 11, 2011. Retrieved October 29, 2006.
- Romano, Lois (January 3, 2007). "Effect of Obama's candor remains to be seen". The Washington Post. p. A1. Archived from the original on May 11, 2008. Retrieved January 14, 2007.
^ "FRONTLINE The Choice 2012". PBS. October 9, 2012. Archived from the original on October 10, 2017. Retrieved October 29, 2012.
^ ^a ^b
Gordon, Larry (January 29, 2007). "Occidental recalls 'Barry' Obama". Los Angeles Times. p. B1. Archived from the original on May 24, 2010. Retrieved May 12, 2010.
- Possley, Maurice (March 30, 2007). "Activism blossomed in college". Chicago Tribune. p. 20. Archived from the original on October 9, 2010. Retrieved May 12, 2010.
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- Goldman, Adam; Tanner, Robert (May 15, 2008). "Old friends recall Obama's years in LA, NYC". USA Today. Associated Press. Retrieved May 12, 2010.
- Helman, Scott (August 25, 2008). "Small college awakened future senator to service (subscription archive)". The Boston Globe. p. 1A. Retrieved May 12, 2010.
- Jackson, Brooks (June 5, 2009). "More 'birther' nonsense: Obama's 1981 Pakistan trip". FactCheck.org. Retrieved May 12, 2010.
- Remnick 2010, pp. 98–112
- Obama 2004, pp. 92–112
- Mendell 2007, pp. 55–62
^ Boss-Bicak, Shira (January 2005). "Barack Obama '83". Columbia College Today. ISSN 0572-7820. Archived from the original on September 5, 2008. Retrieved October 1, 2006.
^ "Remarks by the President in Town Hall". whitehouse.gov. June 26, 2014. Archived from the original on February 16, 2017. Retrieved October 15, 2016 – via National Archives.
^ "The Approval Matrix". New York. August 27, 2012. Archived from the original on May 19, 2020. Retrieved February 18, 2020.
^ Horsley, Scott (July 9, 2008). "Obama's Early Brush With Financial Markets". NPR. Archived from the original on August 3, 2017. Retrieved July 17, 2017.
^
Obama, Barack (1998). "Curriculum vitae". The University of Chicago Law School. Archived from the original on May 9, 2001. Retrieved October 1, 2006.
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^
Scott, Janny (July 30, 2007). "Obama's account of New York often differs from what others say". The New York Times. p. B1. Archived from the original on October 31, 2007. Retrieved July 31, 2007.
- Obama 2004, pp. 133–140
- Mendell 2007, pp. 62–63
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Chassie, Karen, ed. (2007). Who's Who in America, 2008. New Providence, NJ: Marquis Who's Who. p. 3468. ISBN 978-0-8379-7011-0.
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^
Lizza, Ryan (March 19, 2007). "The agitator: Barack Obama's unlikely political education". The New Republic. Vol. 236, no. 12. pp. 22–26, 28–29. ISSN 0028-6583. Archived from the original on November 12, 2010. Retrieved August 21, 2007.
- Secter, Bob; McCormick, John (March 30, 2007). "Portrait of a pragmatist". Chicago Tribune. p. 1. Archived from the original on December 14, 2009. Retrieved May 18, 2012.
- Obama 2004, pp. 140–295
- Mendell 2007, pp. 63–83
^ ^a ^b ^c
Matchan, Linda (February 15, 1990). "A Law Review breakthrough". The Boston Globe. p. 29. Archived from the original on January 22, 2009. Retrieved June 15, 2008.
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^ Shelbourne, Mallory (September 10, 2017). "Former presidents fundraise for Irma disaster relief". The Hill. Retrieved September 11, 2017.
^ Hope, Leah (September 14, 2017). "Obama Foundation holds public meeting about presidential library project". WLS-TV. Retrieved November 17, 2020.
^ Dovere, Edward-Isaac (October 31, 2017). "Obama, opening his foundation's first summit, calls for fixing civic culture". Politico.
^ Neuman, Scott (May 22, 2018). "Obamas Sign Deal With Netflix, Form 'Higher Ground Productions'". NPR. Retrieved September 17, 2018.
^ Harris, Hunter (May 21, 2018). "The Obamas Will Produce Movies and Shows for Netflix". Vulture. Retrieved September 17, 2018.
^ Gonzalez, Sandra (January 13, 2020). "Barack and Michelle Obama's production company scores first Oscar nomination". CNN. Retrieved January 21, 2020.
^ Pitofsky, Marina (October 24, 2018). "Suspicious packages sent to Clintons, Obamas, CNN: What we know so far". USA Today. Archived from the original on October 24, 2018.
^ Lukpat, Alyssa (December 5, 2019). "Obamas reportedly buy Martha's Vineyard waterfront estate for $11.75 million". The Boston Globe.
^ "Barack Obama challenges 'woke' culture". BBC News. October 30, 2019. Retrieved October 4, 2021.
^ Rueb, Emily S.; Taylor, Derrick Bryson (October 31, 2019). "Obama on Call-Out Culture: 'That's Not Activism'". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on October 31, 2019. Retrieved October 4, 2021.
^ Jackson, John Fritze and David. "'Voters themselves must pick': Why Barack Obama isn't endorsing Joe Biden or anyone else for president". USA Today. Retrieved March 18, 2022.
^ Astor, Maggie; Glueck, Katie (April 14, 2020). "Barack Obama Endorses Joe Biden for President". The New York Times. Archived from the original on April 14, 2020.
^ "Obama endorses Joe Biden for president". BBC News. Retrieved March 6, 2021.
^ "DNC 2020: Obama blasts Trump's 'reality show' presidency". BBC News. August 20, 2020. Retrieved March 6, 2021.
^ Harris, Elizabeth A. (September 17, 2020). "Obama's Memoir 'A Promised Land' Coming in November". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on September 17, 2020.
^ Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi (November 12, 2020). "Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie on Barack Obama's 'A Promised Land'". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on November 12, 2020. Retrieved November 17, 2020.
^ Carras, Christi (September 17, 2020). "Barack Obama's new memoir will arrive right after the presidential election". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved November 17, 2020.
^ Gabbatt, Adam (February 22, 2021). "Barack Obama and Bruce Springsteen team up for new podcast". The Guardian. Retrieved March 24, 2021.
^ Sisario, Ben (February 22, 2021). "Barack Obama and Bruce Springsteen: The Latest Podcast Duo". The New York Times. Archived from the original on December 28, 2021. Retrieved March 24, 2021.
^ Otterson, Joe (December 8, 2021). "'Upshaws' Co-Creator Regina Hicks Sets Netflix Overall Deal, to Develop Comedy Series With Obamas' Higher Ground". Variety. Retrieved December 9, 2021.
^ Perez, Lexy (March 5, 2022). "Barack Obama, Lin-Manuel Miranda Among 2022 Audie Awards Winners". Billboard. Retrieved March 6, 2022.
^ "Remarks by President Biden, Vice President Harris, and Former President Obama on the Affordable Care Act". The White House. April 5, 2022. Retrieved April 6, 2022.
^ Benson, Samuel (April 5, 2022). "Obama returns to White House for first time since leaving office". POLITICO. Retrieved April 6, 2022.
^ "Obama's back—for a day—in White House health bill push". AP NEWS. April 5, 2022. Retrieved April 6, 2022.
^ "Barack and Michelle Obama sign with Amazon after Spotify declines to renew audio deal". Fortune. Retrieved June 22, 2022.
^ Chan, J. Clara (June 21, 2022). "The Obamas' Higher Ground Leaves Spotify for Audible Multiyear Deal". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved June 22, 2022.
^ "Meet the artists who painted the Obama White House portraits". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved November 6, 2022.
^ Montgomery, Daniel (September 3, 2022). "2022 Creative Arts Emmy winners list in all categories [UPDATING LIVE]". GoldDerby. Retrieved September 4, 2022.
^ "5 lessons from Obama's national parks show on Netflix". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved May 26, 2022.
^ Jones, Mondaire (October 21, 2022). "Barack Obama is Wrong to Oppose Expanding the Supreme Court". The Nation.
^ "Here's why former US president Barack Obama is in Australia". March 27, 2023. Retrieved March 29, 2023.
^ Staszewska, Ewa (March 28, 2023). "Barack Obama set to reel in $1 million during Aussie speaking tour as he visits Sydney Opera House with wife Michelle". Retrieved March 29, 2023.
^ Vidler, Adam; Theocharous, Mikala (March 28, 2023). "Former US President Barack Obama could net $1 million for Australian speaking gigs". Retrieved March 29, 2023.
^ Mueller, Julia (October 9, 2023). "Obama condemns 'brazen' attacks against Israel". The Hill. Retrieved December 18, 2023.
^ Singh, Kanishka (October 23, 2023). "Obama warns some of Israel's actions in Gaza may backfire". Reuters.
^ "Obama tells allies Biden's path to winning reelection has greatly diminished". The Washington Post. July 18, 2024. Archived from the original on July 18, 2024. Retrieved July 18, 2024.
^ "Obamas endorse Kamala Harris for president". BBC. July 26, 2024.
^ Dovere, Edward-Isaac (October 13, 2024). "Obama's reemergence on the campaign trail for Harris comes as he recognizes his own legacy is at stake". CNN.
^ "Obama urges Black men to show up for Harris as he campaigns in critical Pennsylvania". Associated Press. October 11, 2024.
^ "Obamas Call on Americans to 'Keep Building' a Country That's 'More Equal and More Free'". Rolling Stone. November 6, 2024.
^ Stirland, Sarah Lai (November 30, 2008). "The Obama Campaign: A Great Campaign, or the Greatest?". Wired. Archived from the original on December 11, 2023.
^ Gallo, Carmine. "Barack Obama: A Master Class in Public Speaking [Video]". Forbes.
^ "3 Moments Where President Obama Earned the Title of Great Communicator". September 13, 2016.
^ Zelizer, Julian E. (2018). "Policy Revolution without a Political Transformation". In Zelizer, Julian (ed.). The Presidency of Barack Obama: a First Historical Assessment. Princeton University Press. pp. 1–10. ISBN 978-0-691-16028-3.
^ Kamarck, Elaine (April 6, 2018). "The fragile legacy of Barack Obama". Brookings. Archived from the original on April 6, 2018. Retrieved October 30, 2021.
^ W. Wise, David (April 30, 2019). "Obama's legacy is as a disappointingly conventional president". USAPP. Retrieved November 4, 2022.
^ ^a ^b "Obama Legacy Will Be Recovery from Recession, Affordable Care Act". ABC News. January 20, 2017. Retrieved March 15, 2017.
^ Eibner, Christine; Nowak, Sarah (2018). The Effect of Eliminating the Individual Mandate Penalty and the Role of Behavioral Factors. Commonwealth Fund (Report). doi:10.26099/SWQZ-5G92.
^ Oberlander, Jonathan (June 1, 2010). "Long Time Coming: Why Health Reform Finally Passed". Health Affairs. 29 (6): 1112–1116. doi:10.1377/hlthaff.2010.0447. ISSN 0278-2715. PMID 20530339.
^ Blumenthal, David; Abrams, Melinda; Nuzum, Rachel (June 18, 2015). "The Affordable Care Act at 5 Years". New England Journal of Medicine. 372 (25): 2451–2458. doi:10.1056/NEJMhpr1503614. ISSN 0028-4793. PMID 25946142. S2CID 28486139.
^ Cohen, Alan B.; Colby, David C.; Wailoo, Keith A.; Zelizer, Julian E. (June 1, 2015). Medicare and Medicaid at 50: America's Entitlement Programs in the Age of Affordable Care. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-023156-9.
^ Stolberg, Sheryl Gay; Pear, Robert (March 23, 2010). "Obama Signs Health Care Overhaul into Law". The New York Times.
^ Long, Heather (January 6, 2017). "Final tally: Obama created 11.3 million jobs". CNN.
^ Learish, Jessica (January 6, 2017). "Barack Obama's Legacy: Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform". CBS News. Retrieved March 15, 2017.
^ Bowman, Quinn (October 28, 2009). "Obama Signs Measure to Widen Hate Crimes Law". PBS NewsHour. Retrieved November 8, 2022.
^ Crary, David (January 4, 2017). "LGBT activists view Obama as staunch champion of their cause". Associated Press.
^ Bumiller, Elisabeth (July 22, 2011). "Obama Ends 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' Policy". The New York Times. Archived from the original on July 23, 2011.
^ Kennedy, Kennedy (June 30, 2016). "Pentagon Says Transgender Troops Can Now Serve Openly". The Two-Way. NPR.
^ Smith, Michael; Newport, Frank (January 9, 2017). "Americans Assess Progress Under Obama". The Gallup Organization.
^ Zenko, Micah (January 12, 2016). "Obama's Embrace of Drone Strikes Will Be a Lasting Legacy". The New York Times. Retrieved March 2, 2019.
^ Grandin, Greg (January 15, 2017). "Why Did the US Drop 26,171 Bombs on the World Last Year?". The Nation. Retrieved January 11, 2018.
^ Agerholm, Harriet (January 19, 2017). "Map shows where President Barack Obama dropped his 20,000 bombs". The Independent. Retrieved January 11, 2018.
^ Parsons, Christi; Hennigan, W. J. (January 13, 2017). "President Obama, who hoped to sow peace, instead led the nation in war". Los Angeles Times.
^ Gramlich, John (January 5, 2017). "Federal prison population fell during Obama's term, reversing recent trend". Pew Research Center.
^ Cone, Allen (January 18, 2017). "Obama leaving office at 60 percent approval rating". United Press International. Retrieved February 26, 2017.
^ Agiesta, Jennifer (January 18, 2017). "Obama approval hits 60 percent as end of term approaches". CNN. Retrieved February 26, 2017.
^ Rottinghaus, Brandon; Vaughn, Justin S. (February 13, 2015). "Measuring Obama against the great presidents". Brookings Institution.
^ "The Obama Presidential Center". Barack Obama Foundation. Archived from the original on August 24, 2019. Retrieved October 10, 2023.
^ Williams, Sydney (November 17, 2020). "Former President Barack Obama's third book starts shipping today". NBC News. Retrieved September 22, 2021.
^ Ressner, Jeffrey; Smith, Ben (August 22, 2008). "Exclusive: Obama's Lost Law Review Article". Politico. Archived from the original on February 8, 2021. Retrieved February 20, 2021.

Bibliography

[edit]

Jacobs, Sally H. (2011a). The Other Barack: The Bold and Reckless Life of President Obama's Father. New York: PublicAffairs. ISBN 978-1-58648-793-5.
Maraniss, David (2012). Barack Obama: The Story. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 978-1-4391-6040-4.
Mendell, David (2007). Obama: From Promise to Power. New York: Amistad/HarperCollins. ISBN 978-0-06-085820-9.
Obama, Barack (2004) [1st pub. 1995]. Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance. New York: Three Rivers Press. ISBN 978-1-4000-8277-3.
Obama, Barack (2006a). The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream. New York: Crown Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-307-23769-9.
Remnick, David (2010). The Bridge: The Life and Rise of Barack Obama. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. ISBN 978-1-4000-4360-6.
Scott, Janny (2011). A Singular Woman: The Untold Story of Barack Obama's Mother. New York: Riverhead Books. ISBN 978-1-59448-797-2.

Further reading

[edit]

De Zutter, Hank (December 8, 1995). "What Makes Obama Run?". Chicago Reader. Retrieved April 25, 2015.
Graff, Garrett M. (November 1, 2006). "The Legend of Barack Obama". Washingtonian. Archived from the original on February 14, 2008. Retrieved January 14, 2008.
Koltun, Dave (2005). "The 2004 Illinois Senate Race: Obama Wins Open Seat and Becomes National Political 'Star'". In Ahuja, Sunil; Dewhirst, Robert (eds.). The Road to Congress 2004. Hauppauge, New York: Nova Science Publishers. ISBN 978-1-59454-360-9.
Lizza, Ryan (September 2007). "Above the Fray". GQ. Archived from the original on May 14, 2011. Retrieved October 27, 2010.
MacFarquhar, Larissa (May 7, 2007). "The Conciliator: Where is Barack Obama Coming From?". The New Yorker. Retrieved January 14, 2008.
McClelland, Edward (2010). Young Mr. Obama: Chicago and the Making of a Black President. New York: Bloomsbury Press. ISBN 978-1-60819-060-7.
Parmar, Inderjeet, and Mark Ledwidge. "...'a foundation-hatched black': Obama, the US establishment, and foreign policy" Archived June 27, 2023, at the Wayback Machine. International Politics 54.3 (2017): 373–388.

External links

[edit]

Library resources about
Barack Obama

By Barack Obama

Official

[edit]

Official website of The Obama Foundation
Official website of the Barack Obama Presidential Library
Official website of Organizing for Action
White House biography

Other

[edit]

Column archive at The Huffington Post
Barack Obama on Twitter
United States Congress. "Barack Obama (id: O000167)". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.
Appearances on C-SPAN
Barack Obama at IMDb
Barack Obama collected news and commentary at The New York Times
Barack Obama articles in the archive of the Chicago Tribune
Works by Barack Obama at Project Gutenberg
Works by or about Barack Obama at the Internet Archive
Works by Barack Obama at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)
Barack Obama on Nobelprize.org
Barack Obama at Politifact

Barack Obama

44th President of the United States (2009–2017)
U.S. Senator from Illinois (2005–2008)
Illinois Senator from the 13th district (1997–2004)

Life and
politics

Presidency
(timeline)

Books

Speeches

"The Audacity of Hope" (2004)
"Yes We Can" (2008)
"A More Perfect Union" (2008)
"Change Has Come to America" (2008)
"A New Birth of Freedom" (2009)
Joint session of Congress (2009)
"A New Beginning" (2009)
Joint session of Congress (health care reform) (2009)
State of the Union Address
- 2010
- 2011
- 2012
- 2013
- 2014
- 2015
- 2016
Tucson memorial speech (2011)
Joint session of Congress (jobs) (2011)
"You didn't build that" (2012)
Selma 50th anniversary (2015)
Farewell address (2017)

Elections

Illinois	State Senate 1996 1998 2002 U.S. House of Representatives 2000
U.S. Senate	2004
Presidential	2008 campaign endorsements GOP/conservative support staff members primaries primary campaign running mate selection convention debates election 2012 campaign endorsements primaries convention debates election

Family

Michelle Obama (wife)
Ann Dunham (mother)
Barack Obama Sr. (father)
Lolo Soetoro (stepfather)
Maya Soetoro-Ng (maternal half-sister)
Stanley Armour Dunham (maternal grandfather)
Madelyn Dunham (maternal grandmother)
Auma Obama (paternal half-sister)
Malik Obama (paternal half-brother)
Marian Robinson (mother-in-law)
Craig Robinson (brother-in-law)
Bo (family dog)
Sunny (family dog)

v t e Public image
News and political events	Oprah Winfrey's endorsement Citizenship conspiracy theories litigation Religion conspiracy theories Bill Ayers controversy Jeremiah Wright controversy Republican and conservative support (2008) Assassination threats 2008 Denver 2008 Tennessee First inauguration invitations Inaugural Celebration at the Lincoln Memorial Citizen's Briefing Book Tea Party protests New Energy for America Gates–Crowley Rose Garden meeting Firing of Shirley Sherrod Impeachment efforts Tan suit controversy
Books about	Bibliography Obama: From Promise to Power Barack Obama: Der schwarze Kennedy Redemption Song The Case Against Barack Obama The Obama Nation Culture of Corruption Catastrophe Barack and Michelle The Speech The Obama Story Between Barack and a Hard Place Game Change Obama Zombies Conservative Victory The Bridge The Obama Diaries The Obama Syndrome The Obama Identity O: A Presidential Novel Where's the Birth Certificate? Obama's Last Stand Barack Obama: The Story Game Change 2012 Buyer's Remorse Rising Star Shade The World as It Is
Music	Obama Girl "I Got a Crush... on Obama" "Barack the Magic Negro" will.i.am "Yes We Can" "The President Sang Amazing Grace" "There's No One as Irish as Barack O'Bama" "Sí Se Puede Cambiar" "My President" "Deadheads for Obama" "Air and Simple Gifts" Change Is Now Hope! – Das Obama Musical "Barack Obama vs. Mitt Romney" Barack's Dubs "Signed, Sealed, Delivered I'm Yours"
Film, TV, and stage	By the People: The Election of Barack Obama (2009) Change (2010) Obama Anak Menteng (2010) 2016: Obama's America (2012) The Road We've Traveled (2012) Southside with You (2016) Hillary and Clinton (2016) Barry (2016) America's Great Divide (2020) We the People (2021) Renegades: Born in the USA (2021) Obama: In Pursuit of a More Perfect Union (2021) The First Lady (2022) Picturing the Obamas (2022)
Other media	Social media use Artists for Obama "Hope" poster "Joker" poster Hair Like Mine Situation Room Iman Crosson The Forgotten Man (2010 painting) President Barack Obama (2018 portrait) Obama logo In comics Barack Obama's summer playlist
Related	Barack Obama Day (Illinois) Obama Day (Kenya) Awards and honors Namesakes Higher Ground Productions "One Last Time (44 Remix)" Sunlight before signing

← George W. Bush
Donald Trump →

Category

Offices and distinctions

Illinois Senate
Preceded by Alice Palmer	Member of the Illinois Senate from the 13th district 1997–2004	Succeeded by Kwame Raoul
Party political offices
Preceded by Carol Moseley Braun	Democratic nominee for U.S. Senator from Illinois (Class 3) 2004	Succeeded by Alexi Giannoulias
Preceded by Harold Ford Jr.	Keynote Speaker of the Democratic National Convention 2004	Succeeded by Mark Warner
Preceded by John Kerry	Democratic nominee for President of the United States 2008, 2012	Succeeded by Hillary Clinton
U.S. Senate
Preceded by Peter Fitzgerald	United States Senator (Class 3) from Illinois 2005–2008 Served alongside: Dick Durbin	Succeeded by Roland Burris
Political offices
Preceded by George W. Bush	President of the United States 2009–2017	Succeeded by Donald Trump
Awards and achievements
Preceded by Martti Ahtisaari	Nobel Peace Prize Laureate 2009	Succeeded by Liu Xiaobo
U.S. order of precedence (ceremonial)
Preceded by George W. Bush as former president	Order of precedence of the United States former president	Succeeded by Joe Biden as former president
Diplomatic posts
Preceded by Gordon Brown	Chairperson of the Group of 20 2009	Succeeded by Stephen Harper
Preceded by Naoto Kan	Chair of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation 2011	Succeeded by Vladimir Putin
Preceded by Nicolas Sarkozy	Chair of the Group of Eight 2012	Succeeded by David Cameron

Articles related to Barack Obama

v t e Presidents of the United States
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Category List

(← 2004) 2008 United States presidential election (2012 →)

Democratic Party
▌WFP

Convention superdelegates Polls statewide national Debates Primaries Primary results VP candidate selection
Candidates	Nominee: Barack Obama campaign positions endorsements cross-party VP nominee: Joe Biden positions Other candidates: Evan Bayh campaign Joe Biden campaign positions Hillary Clinton campaign positions endorsements Chris Dodd campaign John Edwards campaign positions Mike Gravel campaign Dennis Kucinich campaign Bill Richardson campaign Tom Vilsack campaign

Republican Party
▌CPNY · ▌IPNY

Candidates

Nominee: John McCain
VP nominee: Sarah Palin
- candidacy
- positions

Draft movements

Democratic: Al Gore
Mark Warner
Republican: Newt Gingrich
Condoleezza Rice
- movement
Independent: Michael Bloomberg
- movement

Third party and independent candidates
Constitution Party (convention)	Nominee: Chuck Baldwin campaign VP nominee: Darrell Castle Other candidates: Daniel Imperato Alan Keyes campaign
Green Party (convention)	Nominee: Cynthia McKinney campaign positions VP nominee: Rosa Clemente Other candidates: Elaine Brown
Libertarian Party (convention)	Nominee: Bob Barr campaign positions VP nominee: Wayne Allyn Root Other candidates: Mike Gravel campaign Steve Kubby Wayne Allyn Root Mary Ruwart Doug Stanhope
America's Independent Party	Nominee: Alan Keyes campaign VP nominee: Brian Rohrbough
Boston Tea Party	Nominee: Charles Jay
Objectivist Party	Nominee: Tom Stevens
Peace and Freedom Party	Nominee: Ralph Nader campaign VP nominee: Matt Gonzalez Other candidates: Gloria La Riva Cynthia McKinney campaign Brian Moore campaign
Prohibition Party	Nominee: Gene Amondson
Reform Party	Nominee: Ted Weill VP nominee: Frank McEnulty
Socialism and Liberation Party	Nominee: Gloria La Riva VP nominee: Eugene Puryear
Socialist Party	Nominee: Brian Moore campaign VP nominee: Stewart Alexander Other candidates: Eric Chester
Socialist Workers Party	Nominee: Róger Calero Alternate nominee: James Harris VP nominee: Alyson Kennedy
Independent / Other	Jeff Boss Stephen Colbert campaign Earl Dodge Bradford Lyttle Frank Moore Joe Schriner Jonathon Sharkey

Other 2008 elections: House
Senate
Gubernatorial

(← 2008) 2012 United States presidential election (2016 →)

Democratic Party

Convention Primaries Results
Candidates	Incumbent nominee: Barack Obama campaign endorsements positions Incumbent VP nominee: Joe Biden positions Challengers Bob Ely Keith Judd Warren Mosler Vermin Supreme Randall Terry John Wolfe

Republican Party

Candidates

Nominee: Mitt Romney
VP nominee: Paul Ryan
- positions

Other candidates

Libertarian Party

Convention
Candidates	Nominee: Gary Johnson campaign VP nominee: Jim Gray Other candidates Carl Person Sam Sloan

Green Party

Convention Primaries
Candidates	Nominee: Jill Stein campaign VP nominee: Cheri Honkala Other candidates: Stewart Alexander Roseanne Barr

Other third-party and independent candidates
American Independent Party	Nominee: Tom Hoefling Other candidates: Wiley Drake Virgil Goode campaign Edward C. Noonan Laurie Roth
American Third Position Party	Nominee: Merlin Miller VP nominee: Virginia Abernethy
Constitution Party	Convention Nominee: Virgil Goode campaign VP nominee: Jim Clymer Other candidates: Laurie Roth Robby Wells
Freedom Socialist Party	Nominee: Stephen Durham
Grassroots Party	Nominee Jim Carlson
Justice Party	Nominee: Rocky Anderson VP nominee: Luis J. Rodriguez
Socialism and Liberation	Nominee: Peta Lindsay
Peace and Freedom Party	Nominee: Roseanne Barr VP nominee: Cindy Sheehan Other candidates: Stewart Alexander Rocky Anderson Peta Lindsay
Prohibition Party	Nominee: Jack Fellure Other candidates: James Hedges
Reform Party	Nominee: Andre Barnett Other candidates: Laurence Kotlikoff Buddy Roemer campaign Robby Wells
Socialist Equality Party	Nominee Jerry White
Socialist Workers Party	Nominee: James Harris
Socialist Party	Nominee: Stewart Alexander campaign VP nominee: Alejandro Mendoza
Independents and others	Objectivist Party Tom Stevens Independents Lee Abramson Randy Blythe Jeff Boss Robert Burck Terry Jones Joe Schriner Michael Bloomberg attempt to draft

Democratic Party

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Speakers,
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v t e United States senators from Illinois
Class 2	Thomas McLean Baker Robinson McRoberts Semple S. Douglas Browning Richardson Yates Logan Davis Cullom Lewis McCormick Deneen Lewis Slattery Brooks P. Douglas Percy Simon Durbin
Class 3	Edwards McLean Kane Ewing Young Breese Shields Trumbull Oglesby Logan Farwell Palmer Mason Hopkins Lorimer Sherman McKinley Glenn Dieterich Lucas Dirksen Smith Stevenson III Dixon Moseley Braun Fitzgerald Obama Burris Kirk Duckworth

Illinois's delegation(s) to the 109th–110th United States Congresses (ordered by seniority)

109th	Senate: ▌R. Durbin (D) · ▌B. Obama (D)	House: ▌H. Hyde (R) ▌L. Evans (D) ▌D. Hastert (R) ▌J. Costello (D) ▌L. Gutiérrez (D) ▌D. Manzullo (R) ▌B. Rush (D) ▌R. LaHood (R) ▌J. Weller (R) ▌J. Jackson Jr. (D) ▌D. Davis (D) ▌J. Shimkus (R) ▌J. Biggert (R) ▌J. Schakowsky (D) ▌T. Johnson (R) ▌M. Kirk (R) ▌R. Emanuel (D) ▌M. Bean (D) ▌D. Lipinski (D)
110th	Senate: ▌R. Durbin (D) · ▌B. Obama (D)	House: ▌D. Hastert (R) ▌J. Costello (D) ▌L. Gutiérrez (D) ▌D. Manzullo (R) ▌B. Rush (D) ▌R. LaHood (R) ▌J. Weller (R) ▌J. Jackson Jr. (D) ▌D. Davis (D) ▌J. Shimkus (R) ▌J. Biggert (R) ▌J. Schakowsky (D) ▌T. Johnson (R) ▌M. Kirk (R) ▌R. Emanuel (D) ▌M. Bean (D) ▌D. Lipinski (D) ▌P. Hare (D) ▌P. Roskam (R) ▌B. Foster (D)

Michelle Obama

First Lady of the United States (2009–2017)

Work

Books

American Grown (2012)
Becoming (2018)
The Light We Carry (2022)

Family

Barack Obama (husband)
Marian Robinson (mother)
Craig Robinson (brother)
Capers Funnye (cousin)
Bo (family dog)
Sunny (family dog)

Public image

Books	Barack and Michelle (2009) Michelle Obama: A Life (2015)
Film	Southside with You (2016) Becoming (2020 documentary)
Television	Waffles + Mochi (2021) We the People (2021) The First Lady (2022) Picturing the Obamas (2022)
Other	The Michelle Obama Musiaqualogy First Lady Michelle Obama (painting) Michelle Obama: The Light Podcast (2023 podcast)

Related

Category

v t e Patriot Act
Titles I · II · III · IV · V · VI · VII · VIII · IX · X · History
Acts modified	Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 Electronic Communications Privacy Act Computer Fraud and Abuse Act Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act Money Laundering Control Act Bank Secrecy Act Right to Financial Privacy Act Fair Credit Reporting Act Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 Victims of Crime Act of 1984 Telemarketing and Consumer Fraud and Abuse Prevention Act
People	George W. Bush John Ashcroft Alberto Gonzales Patrick Leahy Orrin Hatch Jon Kyl Dianne Feinstein Viet D. Dinh Joe Biden Michael Chertoff Barack Obama Eric Holder Chuck Schumer Lamar Smith Bob Graham Jay Rockefeller Arlen Specter Mike Oxley Dick Armey Paul Sarbanes Trent Lott Tom Daschle Russ Feingold Ellen Huvelle Ron Paul Lisa Murkowski Ron Wyden Dennis Kucinich Larry Craig John E. Sununu Richard Durbin Bernie Sanders Jerry Nadler John Conyers Jr. Butch Otter
Government organizations	Federal Bureau of Investigation Department of Justice Select Committee on Intelligence Department of the Treasury FinCEN Department of State National Institute of Standards and Technology Customs Service U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
Non-government organizations	American Civil Liberties Union American Library Association Center for Democracy and Technology Center for Public Integrity Electronic Frontier Foundation Electronic Privacy Information Center Humanitarian Law Project

v t e Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Narrator
2010s	Jeremy Irons (2014) Peter Coyote (2015) Keith David (2016) Meryl Streep (2017) David Attenborough (2018) David Attenborough (2019)
2020s	David Attenborough (2020) Sterling K. Brown (2021) Barack Obama (2022) Barack Obama (2023) Angela Bassett (2024)

v t e Grammy Award for Best Audio Book, Narration & Storytelling Recording
1950s	The Best of the Stan Freberg Shows – Stan Freberg (1958) Lincoln Portrait – Carl Sandburg (1959)
1960s	FDR Speaks – Robert Bialek (producer) (1960) Humor in Music – Leonard Bernstein (1961) The Story-Teller: A Session with Charles Laughton – Charles Laughton (1962) Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? – Edward Albee (playwright) (1963) BBC Tribute to John F. Kennedy – That Was the Week That Was (1964) John F. Kennedy: As We Remember Him – Goddard Lieberson (producer) (1965) Edward R. Murrow - A Reporter Remembers, Vol. I: The War Years – Edward R. Murrow (1966) Gallant Men – Everett Dirksen (1967) Lonesome Cities – Rod McKuen (1968) We Love You Call Collect – Art Linkletter & Diane Linkletter (1969)
1970s	Why I Oppose the War in Vietnam – Martin Luther King Jr. (1970) Desiderata – Les Crane (1971) Lenny – Bruce Botnick (producer) & the Original Broadway Cast (1972) Jonathan Livingston Seagull – Richard Harris (1973) Good Evening – Peter Cook and Dudley Moore (1974) Give 'em Hell, Harry! – James Whitmore (1975) Great American Documents – Henry Fonda, Helen Hayes, James Earl Jones, and Orson Welles (1976) The Belle of Amherst – Julie Harris (1977) Citizen Kane (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) – Orson Welles (1978) Ages of Man: Readings from Shakespeare – John Gielgud (1979)
1980s	Gertrude Stein, Gertrude Stein, Gertrude Stein – Pat Carroll (1980) Donovan's Brain – Orson Welles (1981) Raiders of the Lost Ark: The Movie on Record – Tom Voegeli (producer) and Various Artists (1982) Lincoln Portrait – William Warfield (1983) The Words of Gandhi – Ben Kingsley (1984) Ma Rainey's Black Bottom – Mike Berniker (producer) & the Original Broadway Cast (1985) Interviews from the Class of '55 Recording Sessions – Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, Chips Moman, Ricky Nelson, Roy Orbison, Carl Perkins, and Sam Phillips (1986) Lake Wobegon Days – Garrison Keillor (1987) Speech by Rev. Jesse Jackson – Jesse Jackson (1988) It's Always Something – Gilda Radner (1989)
1990s	Gracie: A Love Story – George Burns (1990) The Civil War – Ken Burns (1991) What You Can Do to Avoid AIDS – Earvin "Magic" Johnson and Robert O'Keefe (1992) On the Pulse of Morning – Maya Angelou (1993) Get in the Van – Henry Rollins (1994) Phenomenal Woman – Maya Angelou (1995) It Takes a Village – Hillary Clinton (1996) Charles Kuralt's Spring – Charles Kuralt (1997) Still Me – Christopher Reeve (1998) The Autobiography of Martin Luther King Jr. – LeVar Burton (1999)
2000s	The Measure of a Man: A Spiritual Autobiography – Sidney Poitier, Rick Harris, and John Runnette (producers) (2000) Q: The Autobiography of Quincy Jones – Quincy Jones, Jeffrey S. Thomas, Steven Strassman (engineers), and Elisa Shokoff (producer) (2001) A Song Flung Up to Heaven – Maya Angelou and Charles B. Potter (producer) (2002) Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them – Al Franken and Paul Ruben (producer) (2003) My Life – Bill Clinton (2004) Dreams from My Father – Barack Obama (2005) Our Endangered Values: America's Moral Crisis – Jimmy Carter / With Ossie and Ruby – Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee (2006) The Audacity of Hope – Barack Obama and Jacob Bronstein (producer) (2007) An Inconvenient Truth by Al Gore – Beau Bridges, Cynthia Nixon, and Blair Underwood (2008) Always Looking Up – Michael J. Fox (2009)
2010s	The Daily Show with Jon Stewart Presents Earth (The Audiobook) – Jon Stewart (2010) If You Ask Me (And of Course You Won't) – Betty White (2011) Society's Child – Janis Ian (2012) America Again: Re-becoming the Greatness We Never Weren't – Stephen Colbert (2013) Diary of a Mad Diva – Joan Rivers (2014) A Full Life: Reflections at 90 – Jimmy Carter (2015) In Such Good Company: Eleven Years of Laughter, Mayhem, and Fun in the Sandbox – Carol Burnett (2016) The Princess Diarist – Carrie Fisher (2017) Faith: A Journey for All – Jimmy Carter (2018) Becoming – Michelle Obama (2019)
2020s	Blowout: Corrupted Democracy, Rogue State Russia, and the Richest, Most Destructive Industry on Earth – Rachel Maddow (2020) Carry On: Reflections for a New Generation from John Lewis − Don Cheadle (2021) Finding Me – Viola Davis (2022) The Light We Carry: Overcoming in Uncertain Times – Michelle Obama (2023) Last Sunday in Plains: A Centennial Celebration – Jimmy Carter (2024)

v t e NAACP Image Award – Chairman's Award
1990s	Janet Jackson (1991) Ron Brown (1992) Maxine Waters and Joseph Madison (1996) Harry Belafonte (1998)
2000s	Aaron McGruder (2001) Danny Glover (2002) The Dave Matthews Band (2003) Barack Obama (2004) The Neville Brothers (2005) Bono (2006) Ruby Dee (2007) Al Gore & Wangari Maathai (2008) Tyler Perry (2009)
2010s	Cathy Hughes (2010) Michelle Howard (2012) Forest Whitaker (2013) Eric Holder (2014) Brittany "Bree" Newsome / Justice League NYC / Concerned Student 1950 Collective at the University of Missouri / The University of Mississippi NAACP College Chapter / Rev. Dr. Otis Moss III / Rev. Dr. Howard-John Wesley / Rev. Dr. Jamal Harrison Bryant / Jussie Smollett (2015) Charles Ogletree (2016) William Lucy (2017) Maxine Waters (2018) John Lewis (2019)
2020s	Rev. James Lawson (2020) Samuel L. Jackson (2021) Bennie Thompson (2022) Amanda Gorman (2023) Kamala Harris (2024)

v t e NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work – Nonfiction
1990s	By Any Means Necessary: The Trials and Tribulations of the Making of 'Malcolm X – Spike Lee and Ralph Wiley (1993) No Award (1994) When We Were Colored – Clifton Taulbert (1995) No Award (1996) No Award (1997) With Ossie & Ruby: In This Life Together – Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee (1998) No Award (1999)
2000s	No Award (2000) Sally Hemmings, An American Scandal – Tina Andrews (2001) Keeping the Faith: Stories of Love, Courage, Healing, and Hope from Black America – Tavis Smiley (2002) Why I Love Black Women – Michael Eric Dyson (2003) Hallelujah! The Welcome Table – Maya Angelou (2004) Is Bill Cosby Right? Or Has the Black Middle Class Lost Its Mind? – Michael Eric Dyson (2005) The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream – Barack Obama (2006) Not on Our Watch – Don Cheadle and John Prendergast (2007) Letter to My Daughter – Maya Angelou (2008) In Search of Our Roots – Henry Louis Gates Jr. (2009)
2010s	The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness – Michelle Alexander (2010) The Wealth Cure: Putting Money in Its Place – Hill Harper (2011) The Oath: The Obama White House and the Supreme Court – Jeffrey Toobin (2012) Envisioning Emancipation: Black Americans and the End of Slavery – Deborah Willis and Barbara Krauthamer (2013) Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption – Bryan Stevenson (2014) Spectacle: The Astonishing Life of Ota Benga – Pamela Newkirk (2015) Hidden Figures – Margot Lee Shetterly (2016) Defining Moments in Black History: Reading Between the Lies – Dick Gregory (2017) For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Politics – Donna Brazile, Yolanda Caraway, Leah D. Daughtry, Minyon Moore, and Veronica Chambers (2018) The Source of Self-Regard: Selected Essays, Speeches, and Meditations – Toni Morrison (2019)
2020s	A Promised Land – Barack Obama (2020) The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story – Nikole Hannah-Jones (2021) Finding Me – Viola Davis (2022) The New Brownies’ Book: A Love Letter to Black Families – Karida L. Brown and Charly Palmer (2023) Love & Whiskey: The Remarkable True Story of Jack Daniel, His Master Distiller Nearest Green, and the Improbable Rise of Uncle Nearest – Fawn Weaver (2024)

v t e Laureates of the Nobel Peace Prize
1901–1925	1901: Henry Dunant / Frédéric Passy 1902: Élie Ducommun / Charles Gobat 1903: Randal Cremer 1904: Institut de Droit International 1905: Bertha von Suttner 1906: Theodore Roosevelt 1907: Ernesto Moneta / Louis Renault 1908: Klas Arnoldson / Fredrik Bajer 1909: A. M. F. Beernaert / Paul Estournelles de Constant 1910: International Peace Bureau 1911: Tobias Asser / Alfred Fried 1912: Elihu Root 1913: Henri La Fontaine 1914 1915 1916 1917: International Committee of the Red Cross 1918 1919: Woodrow Wilson 1920: Léon Bourgeois 1921: Hjalmar Branting / Christian Lange 1922: Fridtjof Nansen 1923 1924 1925: Austen Chamberlain / Charles Dawes
1926–1950	1926: Aristide Briand / Gustav Stresemann 1927: Ferdinand Buisson / Ludwig Quidde 1928 1929: Frank B. Kellogg 1930: Nathan Söderblom 1931: Jane Addams / Nicholas Butler 1932 1933: Norman Angell 1934: Arthur Henderson 1935: Carl von Ossietzky 1936: Carlos Saavedra Lamas 1937: Robert Cecil 1938: Nansen International Office for Refugees 1939 1940 1941 1942 1943 1944: International Committee of the Red Cross 1945: Cordell Hull 1946: Emily Balch / John Mott 1947: Friends Service Council / American Friends Service Committee 1948 1949: John Boyd Orr 1950: Ralph Bunche
1951–1975	1951: Léon Jouhaux 1952: Albert Schweitzer 1953: George C. Marshall 1954: United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees 1955 1956 1957: Lester B. Pearson 1958: Georges Pire 1959: Philip Noel-Baker 1960: Albert Luthuli 1961: Dag Hammarskjöld 1962: Linus Pauling 1963: International Committee of the Red Cross / League of Red Cross Societies 1964: Martin Luther King Jr. 1965: UNICEF 1966 1967 1968: René Cassin 1969: International Labour Organization 1970: Norman Borlaug 1971: Willy Brandt 1972 1973: Lê Đức Thọ (declined award) / Henry Kissinger 1974: Seán MacBride / Eisaku Satō 1975: Andrei Sakharov
1976–2000	1976: Betty Williams / Mairead Corrigan 1977: Amnesty International 1978: Anwar Sadat / Menachem Begin 1979: Mother Teresa 1980: Adolfo Pérez Esquivel 1981: United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees 1982: Alva Myrdal / Alfonso García Robles 1983: Lech Wałęsa 1984: Desmond Tutu 1985: International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War 1986: Elie Wiesel 1987: Óscar Arias 1988: UN Peacekeeping Forces 1989: Tenzin Gyatso (14th Dalai Lama) 1990: Mikhail Gorbachev 1991: Aung San Suu Kyi 1992: Rigoberta Menchú 1993: Nelson Mandela / F. W. de Klerk 1994: Shimon Peres / Yitzhak Rabin / Yasser Arafat 1995: Pugwash Conferences / Joseph Rotblat 1996: Carlos Belo / José Ramos-Horta 1997: International Campaign to Ban Landmines / Jody Williams 1998: John Hume / David Trimble 1999: Médecins Sans Frontières 2000: Kim Dae-jung
2001–present	2001: United Nations / Kofi Annan 2002: Jimmy Carter 2003: Shirin Ebadi 2004: Wangari Maathai 2005: International Atomic Energy Agency / Mohamed ElBaradei 2006: Grameen Bank / Muhammad Yunus 2007: Al Gore / Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 2008: Martti Ahtisaari 2009: Barack Obama 2010: Liu Xiaobo 2011: Ellen Johnson Sirleaf / Leymah Gbowee / Tawakkol Karman 2012: European Union 2013: Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons 2014: Kailash Satyarthi / Malala Yousafzai 2015: Tunisian National Dialogue Quartet 2016: Juan Manuel Santos 2017: International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons 2018: Denis Mukwege / Nadia Murad 2019: Abiy Ahmed 2020: World Food Programme 2021: Maria Ressa / Dmitry Muratov 2022: Ales Bialiatski / Memorial / Center for Civil Liberties 2023: Narges Mohammadi 2024: Nihon Hidankyo

v t e 2009 Nobel Prize laureates
Chemistry	Venki Ramakrishnan (United States/United Kingdom) Thomas A. Steitz (United States) Ada Yonath (Israel)
Literature (2009)	Herta Müller (Germany/Romania)
Peace (2009)	Barack Obama (United States)
Physics	Charles K. Kao (Hong Kong/United Kingdom/United States) Willard Boyle (Canada/United States) George E. Smith (United States)
Physiology or Medicine	Elizabeth Blackburn (United States/Australia) Carol W. Greider (United States) Jack W. Szostak (United Kingdom/United States)
Economic Sciences	Elinor Ostrom (United States) Oliver E. Williamson (United States)
Nobel Prize recipients 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014

v t e Time Persons of the Year
1927–1950	Charles Lindbergh (1927) Walter Chrysler (1928) Owen D. Young (1929) Mohandas Gandhi (1930) Pierre Laval (1931) Franklin D. Roosevelt (1932) Hugh S. Johnson (1933) Franklin D. Roosevelt (1934) Haile Selassie (1935) Wallis Simpson (1936) Chiang Kai-shek / Soong Mei-ling (1937) Adolf Hitler (1938) Joseph Stalin (1939) Winston Churchill (1940) Franklin D. Roosevelt (1941) Joseph Stalin (1942) George Marshall (1943) Dwight D. Eisenhower (1944) Harry S. Truman (1945) James F. Byrnes (1946) George Marshall (1947) Harry S. Truman (1948) Winston Churchill (1949) The American Fighting-Man (1950)
1951–1975	Mohammed Mosaddeq (1951) Elizabeth II (1952) Konrad Adenauer (1953) John Foster Dulles (1954) Harlow Curtice (1955) Hungarian Freedom Fighters (1956) Nikita Khrushchev (1957) Charles de Gaulle (1958) Dwight D. Eisenhower (1959) U.S. Scientists: George Beadle / Charles Draper / John Enders / Donald A. Glaser / Joshua Lederberg / Willard Libby / Linus Pauling / Edward Purcell / Isidor Rabi / Emilio Segrè / William Shockley / Edward Teller / Charles Townes / James Van Allen / Robert Woodward (1960) John F. Kennedy (1961) Pope John XXIII (1962) Martin Luther King Jr. (1963) Lyndon B. Johnson (1964) William Westmoreland (1965) The Generation Twenty-Five and Under (1966) Lyndon B. Johnson (1967) The Apollo 8 Astronauts: William Anders / Frank Borman / Jim Lovell (1968) The Middle Americans (1969) Willy Brandt (1970) Richard Nixon (1971) Henry Kissinger / Richard Nixon (1972) John Sirica (1973) King Faisal (1974) American Women: Susan Brownmiller / Kathleen Byerly / Alison Cheek / Jill Conway / Betty Ford / Ella Grasso / Carla Hills / Barbara Jordan / Billie Jean King / Susie Sharp / Carol Sutton / Addie Wyatt (1975)
1976–2000	Jimmy Carter (1976) Anwar Sadat (1977) Deng Xiaoping (1978) Ayatollah Khomeini (1979) Ronald Reagan (1980) Lech Wałęsa (1981) The Computer (1982) Ronald Reagan / Yuri Andropov (1983) Peter Ueberroth (1984) Deng Xiaoping (1985) Corazon Aquino (1986) Mikhail Gorbachev (1987) The Endangered Earth (1988) Mikhail Gorbachev (1989) George H. W. Bush (1990) Ted Turner (1991) Bill Clinton (1992) The Peacemakers: Yasser Arafat / F. W. de Klerk / Nelson Mandela / Yitzhak Rabin (1993) Pope John Paul II (1994) Newt Gingrich (1995) David Ho (1996) Andrew Grove (1997) Bill Clinton / Ken Starr (1998) Jeff Bezos (1999) George W. Bush (2000)
2001–present	Rudolph Giuliani (2001) The Whistleblowers: Cynthia Cooper / Coleen Rowley / Sherron Watkins (2002) The American Soldier (2003) George W. Bush (2004) The Good Samaritans: Bono / Bill Gates / Melinda Gates (2005) You (2006) Vladimir Putin (2007) Barack Obama (2008) Ben Bernanke (2009) Mark Zuckerberg (2010) The Protester (2011) Barack Obama (2012) Pope Francis (2013) Ebola Fighters: Dr. Jerry Brown / Dr. Kent Brantly / Ella Watson-Stryker / Foday Gollah / Salome Karwah (2014) Angela Merkel (2015) Donald Trump (2016) The Silence Breakers (2017) The Guardians: Jamal Khashoggi / Maria Ressa / Wa Lone / Kyaw Soe Oo / Staff of The Capital (2018) Greta Thunberg (2019) Joe Biden / Kamala Harris (2020) Elon Musk (2021) Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Spirit of Ukraine (2022) Taylor Swift (2023) Donald Trump (2024)

African Americans

History

Culture

Notable people

Education, science
and technology

Religion

Political movements

Civic and economic
groups

Sports

Negro league baseball Baseball color line Black players in professional American football Black NFL quarterbacks Black players in ice hockey Muhammad Ali Arthur Ashe Jack Johnson Joe Louis Jesse Owens Jackie Robinson Serena Williams
Athletic associations and conferences	Central (CIAA) Mid-Eastern (MEAC) Southern (SIAC) Southwestern (SWAC)

Ethnic subdivisions

By African descent
- Fula
- Gullah
- Igbo
- Yoruba
Alabama Creole
Black Indians
Black Southerners
Blaxicans
Great Dismal Swamp maroons
Louisiana Creole
- of color
Melungeon

Demographics

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By state/city

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Diaspora

Africa
- Gambia
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- Liberia
- Sierra Leone
America
Israel
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Lists

Authority control databases
International	ISNI VIAF FAST WorldCat
National	Germany United States France BnF data Japan Italy Australia Czech Republic Russia 2 Spain Romania Portugal Netherlands Norway Taiwan Latvia Croatia Chile Greece Korea Sweden Poland Israel Catalonia Belgium
Academics	CiNii Scopus
Artists	ULAN MusicBrainz RKD Artists Grammy Awards Emmy Awards
People	US Congress Trove Deutsche Biographie Deutsche Synchronkartei DDB
Other	IdRef SNAC