Barrack Obama

Assumed office
January 20, 2009
Vice President
Joe Biden
Preceded by
George W. Bush
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
August 4, 1961 (age 53)
Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S.
Nationality
American
Political party
Democratic
Spouse(s)
Michelle Robinson (m. 1992)
Relations
Stanley Armour Dunham (grandfather)
Madelyn Dunham (grandmother)
Maya Soetoro-Ng (half-sister)
Children
Malia Ann Obama (b. 1998)
Natasha Obama (b. 2001)
Parents
Barack Obama, Sr.
Ann Dunham
Residence
White House (official)
Chicago, Illinois (private)
Alma mater
Occidental College
Columbia University (B.A.)
Harvard Law School (J.D.)
Profession
Lawyer
Professor of constitutional law
Community organizer
Author
Politician
Religion
Christianity
Awards
Nobel Peace Prize
Signature

Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama born August 4, 1961 is the 44th and current President of the United States, and the first African American to hold the office. Born in Honolulu, Hawaii, Obama is a graduate of Columbia University and Harvard Law School, where he served as president of the Harvard Law Review. He was a community organizer in Chicago before earning his law degree. He worked as a civil rights attorney and taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School from 1992 to 2004. He served three terms representing the 13th District in the Illinois Senate from 1997 to 2004, running unsuccessfully for the United States House of Representatives in 2000.
In 2004, Obama received national attention during his campaign to represent Illinois in the United States Senate with his victory in the March Democratic Party primary, his keynote address at the Democratic National Convention in July, and his election to the Senate in November. He began his presidential campaign in 2007 and, after a close primary campaign against Hillary Rodham Clinton in 2008, he won sufficient delegates in the Democratic Party primaries to receive the presidential nomination. He then defeated Republican nominee John McCain in the general election, and was inaugurated as president on January 20, 2009. Nine months after his election, Obama was named the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
During his first two years in office, Obama signed into law economic stimulus legislation in response to the Great Recession in the form of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 and the Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010. Other major domestic initiatives in his first term included the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, often referred to as "Obamacare"; the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act; and the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act of 2010. In foreign policy, Obama ended U.S. military involvement in the Iraq War, increased U.S. troop levels in Afghanistan, signed the New START arms control treaty with Russia, ordered U.S. military involvement in Libya, and ordered the military operation that resulted in the death of Osama bin Laden. In November 2010, the Republicans regained control of the House of Representatives as the Democratic Party lost a total of 63 seats; and, after a lengthy debate over federal spending and whether or not to raise the nation's debt limit, Obama signed the Budget Control Act of 2011 and the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012.
Obama was re-elected president in November 2012, defeating Republican nominee Mitt Romney, and was sworn in for a second term on January 20, 2013. During his second term, Obama has promoted domestic policies related to gun control in response to the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, and has called for full equality for LGBT Americans, while his administration has filed briefs which urged the Supreme Court to strike down the Defense of Marriage Act of 1996 and California's Proposition 8 as unconstitutional. In foreign policy, Obama ordered U.S. military involvement in Iraq in response to gains made by the Islamic State in Iraq after the 2011 withdrawal from Iraq, and has continued the process of ending U.S. combat operations in Afghanistan.
Early life and career
Obama was born on August 4, 1961,at Kapiʻolani Maternity & Gynecological Hospital (now Kapiʻolani Medical Center for Women and Children) in Honolulu, Hawaii, and would become the first President to have been born in Hawaii. His mother, Stanley Ann Dunham, was born in Wichita, Kansas, and was of mostly English ancestry. His father, Barack Obama, Sr., was a Luo from Nyang’oma Kogelo, Kenya. Obama's parents met in 1960 in a Russian class at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, where his father was a foreign student on scholarship.The couple married in Wailuku on Maui on February 2, 1961, and separated when, in late August 1961, Obama's mother moved with their newborn son to attend the University of Washington in Seattle for one year. In the meantime, Obama, Sr. completed his undergraduate economics degree in Hawaii in June 1962, then left to attend graduate school at Harvard University on a scholarship. Obama's parents divorced in March 1964.Obama Sr. returned to Kenya in 1964 where he remarried; he visited Barack in Hawaii only once, in 1971. He died in an automobile accident in 1982 when his son was 21 years old.
In 1963, Dunham met Lolo Soetoro, an Indonesian East–West Center graduate student in geography at the University of Hawaii, and the couple were married on Molokai on March 15, 1965. After two one-year extensions of his J-1 visa, Lolo returned to Indonesia in 1966, followed sixteen months later by his wife and stepson in 1967, with the family initially living in a Menteng Dalam neighborhood in the Tebet subdistrict of south Jakarta, then from 1970 in a wealthier neighborhood in the Menteng subdistrict of central Jakarta. From ages six to ten, Obama attended local Indonesian-language schools: St. Francis of Assisi Catholic School for two years and Besuki Public School for one and a half years, supplemented by English-language Calvert School homeschooling by his mother.
Community organizer and Harvard Law School
Two years after graduating, Obama was hired in Chicago as director of the Developing Communities Project, a church-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.[31][33] He helped set up a job training program, a college preparatory tutoring program, and a tenants' rights organization in Altgeld Gardens.[34] Obama also worked as a consultant and instructor for the Gamaliel Foundation, a community organizing institute.[35] 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.[36][37] He returned to Kenya in 1992 with his fiancée Michelle and his half-sister Auma.[36][38] He returned to Kenya in August 2006 for a visit to his father's birthplace, a village near Kisumu in rural western Kenya.[39]
Obama entered Harvard Law School in the fall of 1988. He was selected as an editor of the Harvard Law Review at the end of his first year,[40] president of the journal in his second year,[34][41] and research assistant to the constitutional scholar Laurence Tribe while at Harvard for two years.[42] During his summers, he returned to Chicago, where he worked as an associate at the law firms of Sidley Austin in 1989 and Hopkins & Sutter in 1990.[43] After graduating with a J.D. magna cum laude[44] from Harvard in 1991, he returned to Chicago.[40] Obama's election as the first black president of the Harvard Law Review gained national media attention[34][41] and led to a publishing contract and advance for a book about race relations,[45] which evolved into a personal memoir. The manuscript was published in mid-1995 as Dreams from My Father.[45]
University of Chicago Law School and civil rights attorney
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.[45][46] 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.[47]
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.[48]
He joined Davis, Miner, Barnhill & Galland, a 13-attorney law firm specializing in civil rights litigation and neighborhood economic development, where he was an associate for three years from 1993 to 1996, then of counsel from 1996 to 2004. His law license became inactive in 2007.[49][50]
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.[31] 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.[31]
Legislative career (1997–2008)
As Illinois State Senator (1997–2004)
Main article: Illinois Senate career of Barack Obama
Obama was elected to the Illinois Senate in 1996, succeeding State Senator Alice Palmer as Senator 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.[51] Once elected, Obama gained bipartisan support for legislation that reformed ethics and health care laws.[52] He sponsored a law that increased tax credits for low-income workers, negotiated welfare reform, and promoted increased subsidies for childcare.[53] In 2001, as co-chairman of the bipartisan Joint Committee on Administrative Rules, Obama supported Republican Governor Ryan's payday loan regulations and predatory mortgage lending regulations aimed at averting home foreclosures.[54]
He was reelected to the Illinois Senate in 1998, defeating Republican Yesse Yehudah in the general election, and was reelected again in 2002.[55] 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.[56]
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.[57] 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.[53][58] During his 2004 general election campaign for U.S. Senate, police representatives credited Obama for his active engagement with police organizations in enacting death penalty reforms.[59] Obama resigned from the Illinois Senate in November 2004 following his election to the U.S. Senate.[60]
Presidential campaigns
2008 presidential campaign
Main articles: United States presidential election, 2008, Barack Obama presidential primary campaign, 2008 and Barack Obama presidential campaign, 2008
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.[96][97] The choice of the announcement site was viewed as symbolic because it was also where Abraham Lincoln delivered his historic "House Divided" speech in 1858.[96][98] Obama emphasized issues of rapidly ending the Iraq War, increasing energy independence, and reforming the health care system,[99] in a campaign that projected themes of hope and change.[100]
A large number of candidates entered the Democratic Party presidential primaries. The field narrowed to a duel between Obama and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton after early contests, with the race remaining close throughout the primary process but with Obama gaining 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.[101] On June 7, 2008, Clinton ended her campaign and endorsed Obama.[102]
On August 23, Obama announced his selection of Delaware Senator Joe Biden as his vice presidential running mate.[103] Obama selected Biden from a field speculated to include former Indiana Governor and Senator Evan Bayh and Virginia Governor Tim Kaine.[104] 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.[105] Obama delivered his acceptance speech, not at the center where the Democratic National Convention was held, but at Invesco Field at Mile High to a crowd of over 75,000; the speech was viewed by over 38 million people worldwide.[106][107]
During both the primary process and the general election, Obama's campaign set numerous fundraising records, particularly in the quantity of small donations.[108] 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.[109]
John McCain was nominated as the Republican candidate, and the two engaged in three presidential debates in September and October 2008.[110] On November 4, Obama won the presidency with 365 electoral votes to 173 received by McCain.[111] Obama won 52.9% of the popular vote to McCain's 45.7%.[112] He became the first African American to be elected president.[113] Obama delivered his victory speech before hundreds of thousands of supporters in Chicago's Grant Park.[114]
Presidency
Main article: Presidency of Barack Obama
See also: Confirmations of Barack Obama's Cabinet and List of presidential trips made by Barack Obama
First days
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.[129] He ordered the closing of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp,[130] but Congress prevented the closure by refusing to appropriate the required funds[131][132][133] and preventing moving any Guantanamo detainee into the U.S. or to other countries.[134] Obama reduced the secrecy given to presidential records.[135] He also revoked President George W. Bush's restoration of President Ronald Reagan's Mexico City Policy prohibiting federal aid to international family planning organizations that perform or provide counseling about abortion.[136]
Domestic policy
Main article: Barack Obama social policy
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.[137] Five days later, he signed the reauthorization of the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) to cover an additional 4 million uninsured children.[138] In March 2009, Obama reversed a Bush-era policy which had limited funding of embryonic stem cell research and pledged to develop "strict guidelines" on the research.[139]
On November 10, 2014, President Obama recommended the Federal Communications Commission reclassify broadband Internet service as a telecommunications service in order to preserve net neutrality.[163][164]
White House advisory and oversight groups
On March 11, 2009, Obama created the White House Council on Women and Girls, which forms 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.[165] The Council is currently chaired by Senior Advisor to the President Valerie Jarrett.[166] Obama also established the White House Task Force to Protect Students from Sexual Assault through an official United States 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.[166][167][168] The current co-chairs of the Task Force are Vice President Joe Biden and Jarrett.[167] The Task Force has been 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 that was first-drafted by Biden.[169]
Economic policy
On February 17, 2009, Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, a $787 billion economic stimulus package aimed at helping the economy recover from the deepening worldwide recession.[170] The act includes increased federal spending for health care, infrastructure, education, various tax breaks and incentives, and direct assistance to individuals.[171]
Environmental policy
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. The well's operator, BP, initiated a containment and cleanup plan, and began drilling two relief wells intended to stop the flow. Obama visited the Gulf on May 2 among visits by members of his cabinet, and again on May 28 and June 4. On May 22, he 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. On May 27, he announced a six-month moratorium on new deepwater drilling permits and leases, pending regulatory review.[206] 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.[207]
In July 2013, Obama expressed reservations and stated he "would reject the Keystone XL pipeline if it increased carbon pollution" or "greenhouse emissions".[208][209] Obama's advisers called for a halt to petroleum exploration in the Arctic in January 2013.[210]
Health care reform
Obama called for Congress to pass legislation reforming health care in the United States, a key campaign promise and a top legislative goal.[211] He proposed an expansion of health insurance coverage to cover the uninsured, to cap premium increases, and to allow people to retain their coverage when they leave or change jobs. His proposal was to spend $900 billion over 10 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.[212][213]
Gun control
On January 16, 2013, one month after the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, President Obama signed 23 executive orders and outlined a series of sweeping proposals regarding gun control.[232] 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.[233]
In February and March 2009, Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham 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.[237] Obama attempted to reach out to Arab leaders by granting his first interview to an Arab cable TV network, Al Arabiya.[238]
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.[239][240] In April, Obama gave a speech in Ankara, Turkey, which was well received by many Arab governments.[241] 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.[242]
War in Afghanistan
Main article: War in Afghanistan (2001–present)
Early in his presidency, Obama moved to bolster U.S. troop strength in Afghanistan.[259] He announced an increase to U.S. troop levels of 17,000 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".[260] 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.[261] 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;[262] 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.[263] In February 2013 Obama said the U.S. military would reduce the troop level in Afghanistan from 68,000 to 34,000 US troops by February 2014.[264]
Israel
In June 2012, Obama said that the bond between the United States and Israel is "unbreakable."[265] 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.[266] 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.[267]
War in Libya
Main article: 2011 military intervention in Libya
In March 2011, as forces loyal to Muammar 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[271] passed unanimously by the U.S. Senate.[272] In response to the unanimous passage of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973 on March 17, Gaddafi—who had previously vowed to "show no mercy" to the rebels of Benghazi[273]—announced an immediate cessation of military activities,[274] yet reports came in that his forces continued shelling Misrata. The next day, on Obama's orders, the U.S. military took part in air strikes to destroy the Libyan government's air defense capabilities to protect civilians and enforce a no-fly-zone,[275] including the use of Tomahawk missiles, B-2 Spirits, and fighter jets.[276][277][278] Six days later, on March 25, by unanimous vote of all of its 28 members, NATO took over leadership of the effort, dubbed Operation Unified Protector.[279] Some Representatives[280] questioned whether Obama had the constitutional authority to order military action in addition to questioning its cost, structure and aftermath.[281][282]
Osama bin Laden
Main article: Death of Osama bin Laden

Starting with information received in July 2010, intelligence developed by the CIA over the next several months determined what they believed to be the location of Osama bin Laden in a large compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, a suburban area 35 miles from Islamabad.[283] CIA head Leon Panetta reported this intelligence to President Obama in March 2011.[283] 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.[283] The operation took place on May 1, 2011, resulting in the death of bin Laden and the seizure of papers, computer drives and disks from the compound.[284][285] DNA testing identified bin Laden's body,[286] which was buried at sea several hours later.[287] 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.[284][288] Reaction to the announcement was positive across party lines, including from former presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush,[289] and from many countries around the world.[290]
Cultural and political image
Main article: Public image of Barack Obama
See also: International media reaction to the United States presidential election, 2008 and International reactions to the United States presidential election, 2012
Obama's family history, upbringing, and Ivy League education differ markedly from those of African-American politicians who launched their careers in the 1960s through participation in the civil rights movement.[291] 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."[292] Obama acknowledged his youthful image in an October 2007 campaign speech, saying: "I wouldn't be here if, time and again, the torch had not been passed to a new generation."[293]
Obama won Best Spoken Word Album Grammy Awards for abridged audiobook versions of Dreams from My Father in February 2006 and for The Audacity of Hope in February 2008.[311] His concession speech after the New Hampshire primary was set to music by independent artists as the music video "Yes We Can", which was viewed 10 million times on YouTube in its first month[312] and received a Daytime Emmy Award.[313] In December 2008 and in 2012, Time magazine named Obama as its Person of the Year.[314] The 2008 awarding was for his historic candidacy and election, which Time described as "the steady march of seemingly impossible accomplishments".[315] On May 25, 2011, Obama became the first President of the United States to address both houses of the UK Parliament in Westminster Hall, London. This was only the 5th occurrence since the start of the 20th century, of a head of state being extended this invitation, following Charles de Gaulle in 1960, Nelson Mandela in 1996, Queen Elizabeth II in 2002 and Pope Benedict XVI in 2010.[316][317]
On October 9, 2009, 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".[318] Obama accepted this award in Oslo, Norway on December 10, 2009, with "deep gratitude and great humility."[319] The award drew a mixture of praise and criticism from world leaders and media figures.[320][321][322][323][324][325][326] Obama's peace prize was called a "stunning surprise" by The New York Times.[327] Obama is the fourth U.S. president to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize and the third to become a Nobel laureate while in office.[328]
Family and personal life
Main article: Family of Barack Obama

Obama posing in the Green Room of the White House with wife Michelle and daughters Sasha and Malia in 2009
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."[329] Obama has a half-sister with whom he was raised (Maya Soetoro-Ng, the daughter of his mother and her Indonesian second husband) and seven half-siblings from his Kenyan father's family – six of them living.[330] Obama's mother was survived by her Kansas-born mother, Madelyn Dunham,[331] until her death on November 2, 2008,[332] 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.[333] 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.[334]
Besides his native English, Obama speaks some basic Indonesian, having learned the language during his four childhood years in Jakarta.[335][336] He plays basketball, a sport he participated in as a member of his high school's varsity team;[337] he is left-handed.
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.[339] In 2009, he threw out the ceremonial first pitch at the all star game while wearing a White Sox jacket.[340] 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.[341] 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.[342]
In June 1989, Obama met Michelle Robinson when he was employed as a summer associate at the Chicago law firm of Sidley Austin.[343] Assigned for three months as Obama's adviser at the firm, Robinson joined him at several group social functions, but declined his initial requests to date.[344] They began dating later that summer, became engaged in 1991, and were married on October 3, 1992.[345] The couple's first daughter, Malia Ann, was born on July 4, 1998,[346] followed by a second daughter, Natasha ("Sasha"), on June 10, 2001.[347] The Obama daughters attended the private University of Chicago Laboratory Schools. When they moved to Washington, D.C., in January 2009, the girls started at the private Sidwell Friends School.[348] The Obamas have two Portuguese Water Dogs, the first, a male named Bo, a gift from Senator Ted Kennedy.[349] In August 2013, Bo was joined by Sunny, a female.
Religious views
Obama is a Christian whose religious views developed in his adult life.[361] 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 (whom Obama has specified elsewhere as "non-practicing Methodists and Baptists"), as being detached from religion, yet "in many ways the most spiritually awakened person that I have ever known." 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."[362]
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."[363] 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."[364][365]
Obama met Trinity United Church of Christ pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright in October 1987, and became a member of Trinity in 1992.[366] He resigned from Trinity in May 2008 during his first presidential campaign after some of Wright's statements were criticized.[367] After a prolonged effort to find a church to attend regularly in Washington, Obama announced in June 2009 that his primary place of worship would be the Evergreen Chapel at Camp David.[368]
Legacy
Honors
See also: List of things named after Barack Obama
It was announced in April 2014 that the Barack Obama College Preparatory High School will open in Chicago, Illinois in 2017.[369]
Presidential library
The deadline for bids for the Obama library was set for June 16, 2014 with several major bids originating in the city of Chicago.[370] Among the leading bids proposed for the competition were proposals from the University of Chicago, the University of Illinois at Chicago, Columbia University in New York and the University of Hawaii.[371]