Barack Obama

Obama with grandfather Stanley Armour Dunham, mother Ann Dunham, and sister Maya Soetoro, mid-1970s in Honolulu

Obama was born on August 4, 1961,^[6] at Kapiolani Medical Center for Women and Children in Honolulu, Hawaii.^[7][8][9] He is the only president born outside the contiguous 48 states.^[10] He was born to an American mother and a 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 US in 1850.^[11] 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.^[12][13] Obama's father, Barack Obama Sr. (1934–1982),^[14][15] was a married^[16][17][18] Luo Kenyan from Nyang'oma Kogelo.^[16][19] Obama's parents met in 1960 in a Russian language class at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, where his father was a foreign student on a scholarship.^[20][21] The couple married in Wailuku, Hawaii, on February 2, 1961, six months before Obama was born.^[22][23]

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 an M.A. in economics. Obama's parents divorced in March 1964.^[24] 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.^[25] He visited his son in Hawaii only once, at Christmas 1971,^[26] before he was killed in an automobile accident in 1982, when Obama was 21 years old.^[27] 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."^[21] He described his struggles as a young adult to reconcile social perceptions of his multiracial heritage.^[28]

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.^[29] 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.^[30]

Education

Obama's school record in St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Elementary School. Obama was enrolled as "Barry Soetoro" (no. 1), and was wrongly recorded as an Indonesian citizen (no. 3) and a Muslim (no. 4).^[31]

At the age of six, Obama and his mother had moved to Indonesia to join his stepfather. From age six to ten, he 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.^[32][33] As a result of his four years in Jakarta, he was able to speak Indonesian fluently as a child.^[34] 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."^[35]

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.^[36] In his youth, Obama went by the nickname "Barry."^[37] 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.^[38] 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.^[39] His mother spent most of the next two decades in Indonesia, divorcing Lolo in 1980 and earning a PhD degree in 1992, before dying in 1995 in Hawaii following unsuccessful treatment for ovarian and uterine cancer.^[40]

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."^[41] 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."^[42] Obama was also a member of the "choom gang", a self-named group of friends who spent time together and occasionally smoked marijuana.^[43][44]

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.^[45] 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.^[45] 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^[46] and in English literature^[47] and lived off-campus on West 109th Street.^[48] 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,^[49][50] 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.^[51][52][53]

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.^[52][54] He helped set up a job training program, a college preparatory tutoring program, and a tenants' rights organization in Altgeld Gardens.^[55] Obama also worked as a consultant and instructor for the Gamaliel Foundation, a community organizing institute.^[56] 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.^[57][58]

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.^[60] He was selected as an editor of the Harvard Law Review at the end of his first year,^[61] president of the journal in his second year,^[55][62] and research assistant to the constitutional scholar Laurence Tribe while at Harvard.^[63] 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.^[64] Obama's election as the first black president of the Harvard Law Review gained national media attention^[55][62] and led to a publishing contract and advance for a book about race relations,^[65] which evolved into a personal memoir. The manuscript was published in mid-1995 as Dreams from My Father.^[65] Obama graduated from Harvard Law in 1991 with a Juris Doctor magna cum laude.^[66][61]

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.^[65][67] 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.^[68]

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.^[69]

Family and personal life

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."^[70] 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.^[71] Obama's mother was survived by her Kansas-born mother, Madelyn Dunham,^[72] until her death on November 2, 2008,^[73] 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.^[74] 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.^[75][76][77]

Obama lived with anthropologist Sheila Miyoshi Jager while he was a community organizer in Chicago in the 1980s.^[78] He proposed to her twice, but both Jager and her parents turned him down.^[78][79] The relationship was not made public until May 2017, several months after his presidency had ended.^[79]

Obama poses in the Green Room of the White House with wife Michelle and daughters Sasha and Malia, 2009.

In June 1989, Obama met Michelle Robinson when he was employed as a summer associate at the Chicago law firm of Sidley Austin.^[80] 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.^[81] They began dating later that summer, became engaged in 1991, and were married on October 3, 1992.^[82] After suffering a miscarriage, Michelle underwent in vitro fertilization to conceive their children.^[83] The couple's first daughter, Malia Ann, was born in 1998,^[84] followed by a second daughter, Natasha ("Sasha"), in 2001.^[85] 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.^[86] The Obamas had two Portuguese Water Dogs; the first, a male named Bo, was a gift from Senator Ted Kennedy.^[87] In 2013, Bo was joined by Sunny, a female.^[88] Bo died of cancer on May 8, 2021.^[89]

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.^[90] In 2009, he threw out the ceremonial first pitch at the All-Star Game while wearing a White Sox jacket.^[91] 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.^[92] 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.^[93] He plays basketball, a sport he participated in as a member of his high school's varsity team,^[94] and he is left-handed.^[95]

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 $2.2 million in 2021) in neighboring Kenwood, Chicago.^[96] 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.^[97]

In December 2007, Money Magazine estimated Obama's net worth at $1.3 million (equivalent to $1.7 million in 2021).^[98] 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.^[99][100] 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.^[101][102] Per his 2012 financial disclosure, Obama may be worth as much as $10 million.^[103]

Last name

Obama's last name originates from Luo people. In Luo language, it means "bent over" or "limping".^[104]

Religious views

Obama is a Protestant Christian whose religious views developed in his adult life.^[105] 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."^[106]

The Obamas worship at African Methodist Episcopal Church in Washington, D.C., January 2013

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."^[107] 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.^[108][109]

Obama met Trinity United Church of Christ pastor Jeremiah Wright in October 1987 and became a member of Trinity in 1992.^[110] During Obama's first presidential campaign in May 2008, he resigned from Trinity after some of Wright's statements were criticized.^[111] 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.^{[112][113][114]}

In 2016, he 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.^[115][116]

Discover more about Early life and career related topics

Early life and career of Barack Obama

Early life and career of Barack Obama

Barack Obama, the 44th president of the United States, was born on August 4, 1961, in Honolulu, Hawaii to Barack Obama, Sr. (1936–1982) and Stanley Ann Dunham, known as Ann (1942–1995).

Ann Dunham

Ann Dunham

Stanley Ann Dunham was an American anthropologist who specialized in the economic anthropology and rural development of Indonesia. She is the mother of Barack Obama, the 44th president of the United States. Dunham was known as Stanley Ann Dunham through high school, then as Ann Dunham, Ann Obama, Ann Soetoro, a.k.a. Ann Sutoro, and resumed her maiden name, Ann Dunham, later in life.

Maya Soetoro-Ng

Maya Soetoro-Ng

Maya Kasandra Soetoro-Ng is an Indonesian-born American academic, who is a faculty specialist at the Spark M. Matsunaga Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution, based in the College of Social Sciences at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. She is also a consultant for the Obama Foundation, working to develop the Asia-Pacific Leaders Program. Formerly a high school history teacher, Soetoro-Ng is the maternal half-sister of Barack Obama, the 44th president of the United States.

Honolulu

Honolulu

Honolulu is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Hawaii, which is in the Pacific Ocean. It is the unincorporated county seat of the consolidated City and County of Honolulu, situated along the southeast coast of the island of Oʻahu, and is the westernmost and southernmost major U.S. city. Honolulu is Hawaii's main gateway to the world. It is also a major hub for business, finance, hospitality, and military defense in both the state and Oceania. The city is characterized by a mix of various Asian, Western, and Pacific cultures, reflected in its diverse demography, cuisine, and traditions.

Kapiolani Medical Center for Women and Children

Kapiolani Medical Center for Women and Children

Kapiʻolani Medical Center for Women and Children is part of Hawaii Pacific Health's network of hospitals. It is located in Honolulu, Hawaii, within the residential inner-city district of Makiki. Kapiʻolani Medical Center is Hawaii's only children's hospital with a team of physicians and nurses and specialized technology trained specifically to care for children, from infants to young adults. It is the state's only 24-hour pediatric emergency department, pediatric intensive care unit and adolescent unit. The hospital provides comprehensive pediatric specialties and subspecialties to infants, children, teens, and young adults aged 0–21 throughout Hawaii.

Contiguous United States

Contiguous United States

The contiguous United States consists of the 48 adjoining U.S. states and the District of Columbia of the United States of America. The term excludes the only two non-contiguous states, Alaska and Hawaii, and all other offshore insular areas, such as American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The colloquial term "Lower 48" is used also, especially in relation to just Alaska.

Moneygall

Moneygall

Moneygall is a small village on the border of counties Offaly and Tipperary, in Ireland. It is situated on the R445 road between Dublin and Limerick. There were 313 people living in the village as of the 2016 census. Moneygall has a Catholic church, motorway service station, a car sales and repair centre, a national school, a Garda station and two pubs. The nearest Church of Ireland church, Borrisnafarney, is 2 km from the village beside the former Loughton Demesne.

Ancestry.com

Ancestry.com

Ancestry.com LLC is an American genealogy company based in Lehi, Utah. The largest for-profit genealogy company in the world, it operates a network of genealogical, historical records, and related genetic genealogy websites.

John Punch (slave)

John Punch (slave)

John Punch was an enslaved African who lived in the colony of Virginia. Thought to have been an indentured servant, Punch attempted to escape to Maryland and was sentenced in July 1640 by the Virginia Governor's Council to serve as a slave for the remainder of his life. Two European men who ran away with him received a lighter sentence of extended indentured servitude. For this reason, some historians consider John Punch the "first official slave in the English colonies," and his case as the "first legal sanctioning of lifelong slavery in the Chesapeake." Some historians also consider this to be one of the first legal distinctions between Europeans and Africans made in the colony, and a key milestone in the development of the institution of slavery in the United States.

Colony of Virginia

Colony of Virginia

The Colony of Virginia, chartered in 1606 and settled in 1607, was the first enduring English colony in North America, following failed attempts at settlement on Newfoundland by Sir Humphrey Gilbert in 1583 and the Roanoke Colony by Sir Walter Raleigh in the late 1580s.

Barack Obama Sr.

Barack Obama Sr.

Barack Hussein Obama Sr. was a Kenyan senior governmental economist and the father of Barack Obama, the 44th president of the United States. He is a central figure of his son's memoir, Dreams from My Father (1995). Obama married in 1954 and had two children with his first wife, Kezia. He was selected for a special program to attend college in the United States and studied at the University of Hawaii where he met Stanley Ann Dunham, whom he married in 1961 following the conception of his son, Barack II. Dunham divorced Obama three years later. The elder Obama later went to Harvard University for graduate school, where he earned an M.A. in economics, and returned to Kenya in 1964. He saw his son Barack once more, when his son was about 10.

Nyang'oma Kogelo

Nyang'oma Kogelo

Nyang'oma Kogelo, also known as Kogelo, is a village in Siaya County, Kenya. It is located near the equator, 60 kilometres (37 mi) west-northwest of Kisumu, the former Nyanza provincial capital. The population of Nyangoma-Kogelo is 3,648.

Civil Rights attorney

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. In 1994, he was listed as one of the lawyers in Buycks-Roberson v. Citibank Fed. Sav. Bank, 94 C 4094 (N.D. Ill.). This class action lawsuit was filed in 1994 with Selma Buycks-Roberson as lead plaintiff and alleged that Citibank Federal Savings Bank had engaged in practices forbidden under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act and the Fair Housing Act. The case was settled out of court. Final judgment was issued on May 13, 1998, with Citibank Federal Savings Bank agreeing to pay attorney fees.

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.^[52] 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.^[52] Obama's law license became inactive in 2007.^[117][118]

Discover more about Legal career related topics

Associate attorney

Associate attorney

An associate attorney is a lawyer and an employee of a law firm who does not hold an ownership interest as a partner.

Of counsel

Of counsel

Of counsel is the title of an attorney in the legal profession of the United States who often has a relationship with a law firm or an organization but is neither an associate nor partner. Some firms use titles such as "counsel", "special counsel", and "senior counsel" for the same concept. According to American Bar Association Formal Opinion 90-357, the term "of counsel" is used to describe a "close, personal, continuous, and regular relationship" between the firm and counsel lawyer. In large law firms, the title generally denotes a lawyer with the experience of a partner, but who does not carry the same workload or business development responsibility.

Equal Credit Opportunity Act

Equal Credit Opportunity Act

The Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA) is a United States law, enacted 28 October 1974, that makes it unlawful for any creditor to discriminate against any applicant, with respect to any aspect of a credit transaction, on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, sex, marital status, or age ; the applicant's use of a public assistance program to receive all or part of their income; or the applicant's previous good-faith exercise of any right under the Consumer Credit Protection Act. The law applies to any person who, in the ordinary course of business, regularly participates in a credit decision, including banks, retailers, bankcard companies, finance companies, and credit unions.

Woods Fund of Chicago

Woods Fund of Chicago

The Woods Fund of Chicago is a private independent foundation in Chicago, whose goal is to increase opportunities for less-advantaged people and communities in the Chicago metropolitan area, including the opportunity to shape decisions affecting them.

Joyce Foundation

Joyce Foundation

The Joyce Foundation is a non-operating private foundation based in Chicago, Illinois. As of 2021, it had assets of approximately $1.1 billion and distributes $50 million in grants per year and primarily funds organizations in the Great Lakes region.

Chicago Annenberg Challenge

Chicago Annenberg Challenge

The Chicago Annenberg Challenge (CAC) was a Chicago public school reform project from 1995 to 2001 that worked with half of Chicago's public schools and was funded by a $49.2 million, 2-to-1 matching challenge grant over five years from the Annenberg Foundation. The grant was contingent on being matched by $49.2 million in private donations and $49.2 million in public money. The Chicago Annenberg Challenge was one of 18 locally designed Annenberg Challenge project sites that received $387 million over five years as part of Walter Annenberg's gift of $500 million over five years to support public school reform. The Chicago Annenberg Challenge helped create a successor organization, the Chicago Public Education Fund (CPEF), committing $2 million in June 1998 as the first donor to Chicago's first community foundation for education.

Illinois Senate (1997–2004)

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.^[119] Once elected, Obama gained bipartisan support for legislation that reformed ethics and health care laws.^[120][121] He sponsored a law that increased tax credits for low-income workers, negotiated welfare reform, and promoted increased subsidies for childcare.^[122] 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.^[123][124]

He was reelected to the Illinois Senate in 1998, defeating Republican Yesse Yehudah in the general election, and was re-elected again in 2002.^[125][126] 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.^[127]

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.^[128] 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.^{[122][129][130][131]} 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.^[132] Obama resigned from the Illinois Senate in November 2004 following his election to the U.S. Senate.^[133]

2004 U.S. Senate campaign

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.^[134]

Obama was an early opponent of the George W. Bush administration's 2003 invasion of Iraq.^[135] On October 2, 2002, the day President Bush and Congress agreed on the joint resolution authorizing the Iraq War,^[136] Obama addressed the first high-profile Chicago anti-Iraq War rally,^[137] and spoke out against the war.^[138] He addressed another anti-war rally in March 2003 and told the crowd "it's not too late" to stop the war.^[139]

Decisions by Republican incumbent Peter Fitzgerald and his Democratic predecessor Carol Moseley Braun to not participate in the election resulted in wide-open Democratic and Republican primary contests involving 15 candidates.^[140] 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.^[141] In July 2004, Obama delivered the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention,^[142] seen by nine million viewers. His speech was well received and elevated his status within the Democratic Party.^[143]

Obama's expected opponent in the general election, Republican primary winner Jack Ryan, withdrew from the race in June 2004.^[144] Six weeks later, Alan Keyes accepted the Republican nomination to replace Ryan.^[145] 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.^[146] He took 92 of the state's 102 counties, including several where Democrats traditionally do not do well.

U.S. Senate (2005–2008)

Official portrait of Obama as a member of the United States Senate

Obama was sworn in as a senator on January 3, 2005,^[147] becoming the only Senate member of the Congressional Black Caucus.^[148] He introduced two initiatives that bore his name: Lugar–Obama, which expanded the Nunn–Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction concept to conventional weapons;^[149] and the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006, which authorized the establishment of USAspending.gov, a web search engine on federal spending.^[150] 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.^[151] He also cosponsored the Secure America and Orderly Immigration Act.^[152]

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.^[153][154] 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.^[155][156]

Later in 2007, Obama sponsored an amendment to the Defense Authorization Act to add safeguards for personality-disorder military discharges.^[157] This amendment passed the full Senate in the spring of 2008.^[158] 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;^[159] and co-sponsored legislation to reduce risks of nuclear terrorism.^[160] 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.^[161]

Obama held assignments on the Senate Committees for Foreign Relations, Environment and Public Works and Veterans' Affairs through December 2006.^[162] 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.^[163] He also became Chairman of the Senate's subcommittee on European Affairs.^[164] 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.^[165]

Obama resigned his Senate seat on November 16, 2008, to focus on his transition period for the presidency.^[166]

Discover more about Legislative career related topics

Illinois Senate career of Barack Obama

Illinois Senate career of Barack Obama

Barack Obama served three terms in the Illinois Senate from 1997 to 2005, when he was elected to the United States Senate. During this part of his career, Obama continued teaching constitutional law part time at the University of Chicago Law School as he had done as a Lecturer from 1992 to 1996, and as a Senior Lecturer from 1996 to 2004.

Illinois Senate

Illinois Senate

The Illinois Senate is the upper chamber of the Illinois General Assembly, the legislative branch of the government of the State of Illinois in the United States. The body was created by the first state constitution adopted in 1818. Under the Illinois Constitution of 1970, the Illinois Senate is made up of 59 senators elected from individual legislative districts determined by population and redistricted every 10 years; based on the 2020 U.S. census each senator represents approximately 213,347 people. Senators are divided into three groups, each group having a two-year term at a different part of the decade between censuses, with the rest of the decade being taken up by two four-year terms. This ensures that the Senate reflects changes made when the General Assembly redistricts itself after each census.

Alice Palmer (politician)

Alice Palmer (politician)

Alice J. Palmer is an American educator and politician who served as a member of the Illinois Senate. Known as a longtime progressive activist, Palmer represented the state's 13th Senate District from June 6, 1991, until January 8, 1997. At the time, the district spanned an economically diverse area and included the Chicago communities of Hyde Park, South Shore and Englewood.

Hyde Park, Chicago

Hyde Park, Chicago

Hyde Park is the 41st of the 77 community areas of Chicago. It is located on the South Side, near the shore of Lake Michigan 7 miles (11 km) south of the Loop.

Kenwood, Chicago

Kenwood, Chicago

Kenwood, one of Chicago's 77 community areas, is on the shore of Lake Michigan on the South Side of the city. Its boundaries are 43rd Street, 51st Street, Cottage Grove Avenue, and the lake. Kenwood was originally part of Hyde Park Township, which was annexed to the city of Chicago in 1889. Kenwood was once one of Chicago's most affluent neighborhoods, and it still has some of the largest single-family homes in the city. It contains two Chicago Landmark districts, Kenwood and North Kenwood. A large part of the southern half of the community area is in the Hyde Park-Kenwood Historic District. In recent years, Kenwood has received national attention as the home of former U.S. President Barack Obama.

Chicago Lawn, Chicago

Chicago Lawn, Chicago

Chicago Lawn is one of the 77 community areas of Chicago, Illinois. It is located on the southwest side of the city. Its community neighbors include Gage Park, West Englewood, Ashburn, and West Lawn. It is bounded by Bell Avenue on the east, Central Park Avenue on the west, 59th Street on the north, and 75th Street on the south, and is 13 km (8.1 mi) southwest of the Loop. Local citizens refer to the area as "Marquette Park," after the park in its center.

Foreclosure

Foreclosure

Foreclosure is a legal process in which a lender attempts to recover the balance of a loan from a borrower who has stopped making payments to the lender by forcing the sale of the asset used as the collateral for the loan.

2000 Illinois's 1st congressional district election

2000 Illinois's 1st congressional district election

The 2000 United States House of Representatives election for the 1st district in Illinois took place on November 7, 2000 to elect a representative from Illinois's 1st congressional district for the 107th United States Congress. Incumbent Democratic Representative Bobby Rush faced a primary challenge from Illinois Senator and future President Barack Obama. Rush defeated Obama 61 percent to 30 percent, with other candidates combining for the remaining nine percent. Rush later defeated his Republican opponent, Raymond Wardingley, 88 percent to 12 percent, ensuring his reelection. Subsequent to this election, Obama was elected to the Senate in 2004, and later elected President in 2008.

Illinois's 1st congressional district

Illinois's 1st congressional district

Illinois's first congressional district is a congressional district in the U.S. state of Illinois. Based in Cook County, the district includes much of the South Side of Chicago, and continues southwest to Joliet.

Bobby Rush

Bobby Rush

Bobby Lee Rush is an American politician, activist and pastor who served as the U.S. representative for Illinois's 1st congressional district for three decades. A civil rights activist during the 1960s, Rush co-founded the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party.

Capital punishment in the United States

Capital punishment in the United States

In the United States, capital punishment is a legal penalty throughout the country at the federal level, in 27 states, and in American Samoa. It is also a legal penalty for some military offenses. Capital punishment has been abolished in 23 states and in the federal capital, Washington, D.C. Capital punishment is, in practice, only applied for aggravated murder. Although it is a legal penalty in 27 states, only 20 states have the ability to execute death sentences, with the other seven, as well as the federal government, being subject to different types of moratoriums. The existence of capital punishment in the United States can be traced to early colonial Virginia. Along with Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore, the United States is one of five advanced democracies and the only Western nation that applies the death penalty regularly. It is one of 54 countries worldwide applying it, and was the first to develop lethal injection as a method of execution, which has since been adopted by five other countries. The Philippines has since abolished executions, and Guatemala has done so for civil offenses, leaving the United States as one of four countries to still use this method. It is common practice for the condemned to be administered sedatives prior to execution, regardless of the method used.

2004 United States Senate election in Illinois

2004 United States Senate election in Illinois

The 2004 United States Senate election in Illinois was held on November 2, 2004. Incumbent Republican U.S. Senator Peter Fitzgerald decided to retire after one term. The Democratic and Republican primary elections were held in March, which included a total of 15 candidates who combined to spend a record total of over $60 million seeking the open seat.

2008

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.^[167][168] The choice of the announcement site was viewed as symbolic, as it was also where Abraham Lincoln delivered his "House Divided" speech in 1858.^[167][169] Obama emphasized issues of rapidly ending the Iraq War, increasing energy independence, and reforming the health care system.^[170]

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 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.^[171] On June 2, 2008, Obama had received enough votes to clinch his election. After an initial hesitation to concede, on June 7, Clinton ended her campaign and endorsed Obama.^[172] On August 23, 2008, Obama announced his selection of Delaware Senator Joe Biden as his vice presidential running mate.^[173] Obama selected Biden from a field speculated to include former Indiana Governor and Senator Evan Bayh and Virginia Governor Tim Kaine.^[173] 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.^[174][175] 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.^{[176][177][178]} During both the primary process and the general election, Obama's campaign set numerous fundraising records, particularly in the quantity of small donations.^[179] 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.^[180]

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.^[181] On November 4, Obama won the presidency with 365 electoral votes to 173 received by McCain.^[182] Obama won 52.9 percent of the popular vote to McCain's 45.7 percent.^[183] He became the first African-American to be elected president.^[2] Obama delivered his victory speech before hundreds of thousands of supporters in Chicago's Grant Park.^[184] He is one of the three United States senators moved directly from the U.S. Senate to the White House, the others are Warren G. Harding and John F. Kennedy.^[185]

2012

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.^{[186][187][188]} As the incumbent president, he ran virtually unopposed in the Democratic Party presidential primaries,^[189] and on April 3, 2012, Obama secured the 2778 convention delegates needed to win the Democratic nomination.^[190] 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.^[191]

On November 6, 2012, Obama won 332 electoral votes, exceeding the 270 required for him to be reelected as president.^{[192][193][194]} With 51.1 percent of the popular vote,^[195] Obama became the first Democratic president since Franklin D. Roosevelt to win the majority of the popular vote twice.^[196][197] 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."^[198][199]

Discover more about Presidential campaigns related topics

2008 United States presidential election

2008 United States presidential election

The 2008 United States presidential election was the 56th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 4, 2008. The Democratic ticket of Barack Obama, the junior senator from Illinois, and Joe Biden, the senior senator from Delaware, defeated the Republican ticket of John McCain, the senior senator from Arizona, and Sarah Palin, the governor of Alaska. Obama became the first African American to be elected to the presidency, as well as being only the third sitting United States senator elected president, joining Warren G. Harding and John F. Kennedy. Meanwhile, Biden became the first senator running mate of a senator elected president since Lyndon B. Johnson in the 1960 election.

Barack Obama 2008 presidential primary campaign

Barack Obama 2008 presidential primary campaign

On February 10, 2007, Barack Obama, then-junior United States senator from Illinois, announced his candidacy for the presidency of the United States in Springfield, Illinois. Obama announced his candidacy at the Old State Capitol building, where Abraham Lincoln had delivered his "House Divided" speech. Obama was the main challenger, along with John Edwards, to front-runner Hillary Clinton for much of 2007. He had only recently emerged as a national figure in Democratic politics, having delivered the DNC keynote address just three years prior and won his Senate election shortly thereafter.

Barack Obama 2008 presidential campaign

Barack Obama 2008 presidential campaign

The 2008 presidential campaign of Barack Obama began on February 10, 2007, when Barack Obama, then junior United States senator from Illinois, announced his candidacy for President of the United States in Springfield, Illinois. After winning a majority of delegates in the Democratic primaries of 2008, on August 23, leading up to the convention, the campaign announced that Senator Joe Biden of Delaware would be the vice presidential nominee. At the 2008 Democratic National Convention on August 27, Barack Obama was formally selected as the Democratic Party nominee for President of the United States in 2008. He was the first African American in history to be nominated on a major party ticket.

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln was an American lawyer, politician, and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the Union through the American Civil War to defend the nation as a constitutional union and succeeded in abolishing slavery, bolstering the federal government, and modernizing the U.S. economy.

Energy policy of the United States

Energy policy of the United States

The energy policy of the United States is determined by federal, state, and local entities. It addresses issues of energy production, distribution, consumption, and modes of use, such as building codes, mileage standards, and commuting policies. Energy policy may be addressed via include legislation, regulation, court decisions, public participation, and other techniques.

2008 Democratic Party presidential primaries

2008 Democratic Party presidential primaries

From January 3 to June 3, 2008, voters of the Democratic Party chose their nominee for president in the 2008 United States presidential election. Senator Barack Obama of Illinois was selected as the nominee, becoming the first African American to secure the presidential nomination of any major political party in the United States. However, due to a close race between Obama and Senator Hillary Clinton of New York, the contest remained competitive for longer than expected; neither candidate received enough pledged delegates from state primaries and caucuses to achieve a majority, without endorsements from unpledged delegates (superdelegates).

Delegate (American politics)

Delegate (American politics)

A delegate is a person selected to represent a group of people in some political assembly of the United States.

Caucus

Caucus

A caucus is a meeting of supporters or members of a specific political party or movement. The exact definition varies between different countries and political cultures.

2008 Democratic Party vice presidential candidate selection

2008 Democratic Party vice presidential candidate selection

This article lists potential candidates for the Democratic nomination for Vice President of the United States in the 2008 presidential election. After Illinois Senator Barack Obama became the Democratic Party's presumptive presidential nominee on June 3, 2008, Obama formed a small committee, made up of James A. Johnson, Eric Holder and Caroline Kennedy, to help him select a running mate. Veteran Democratic lawyer and advisor James "Jim" Hamilton, of the firm Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, later replaced Johnson in vetting candidates.

Delaware

Delaware

Delaware is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Maryland to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and New Jersey and the Atlantic Ocean to its east. The state takes its name from the adjacent Delaware Bay, in turn named after Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr, an English nobleman and Virginia's first colonial governor.

Evan Bayh

Evan Bayh

Birch Evans Bayh III is an American lawyer, lobbyist, and Democratic Party politician who served as a United States senator from Indiana from 1999 to 2011 and the 46th governor of Indiana from 1989 to 1997.

2008 Democratic National Convention

2008 Democratic National Convention

The 2008 Democratic National Convention was a quadrennial presidential nominating convention of the Democratic Party where it adopted its national platform and officially nominated its candidates for president and vice president. The convention was held in Denver, Colorado, from August 25 to 28, 2008, at the Pepsi Center. Senator Barack Obama from Illinois gave his acceptance speech on August 28 at Invesco Field in what the party called an "Open Convention". Denver last hosted the Democratic National Convention in 1908. Obama became the party's first nonwhite nominee, and nominee of African descent, for president. Senator Joe Biden from Delaware was nominated for vice president.

First 100 days

Obama takes the oath of office administered by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. at the Capitol, January 20, 2009.

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.^[200] He ordered the closing of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp,^[201] but Congress prevented the closure by refusing to appropriate the required funds^[202][203] and preventing moving any Guantanamo detainee.^[204] Obama reduced the secrecy given to presidential records.^[205] 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.^[206]

Domestic 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.^[207] Five days later, he signed the reauthorization of the State Children's Health Insurance Program to cover an additional four million uninsured children.^[208] 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.^[209]

Obama delivers a speech at joint session of Congress with Vice President Joe Biden and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on February 24, 2009.

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,^[210] becoming the first Supreme Court Justice of Hispanic descent.^[211] 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.^[212]

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 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]

Obama visits an Aurora shooting victim at University of Colorado Hospital, 2012.

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. On January 5, 2016, Obama announced new executive actions extending background check requirements to more gun sellers.^[216]

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

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 "postracial 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 noted 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 and same-sex marriage

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]

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,^[199] 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

On February 17, 2009, Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, a $787 billion (equivalent to $994 billion in 2021) 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 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]

Deficit and debt increases, 2001–2016

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.^[265] 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.^[266] Growth continued in 2010, posting an increase of 3.7 percent in the first quarter, with lesser gains throughout the rest of the year.^[266] 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."^[267] Overall, the economy expanded at a rate of 2.9 percent in 2010.^[268]

U.S. unemployment rate and monthly changes in net employment during Obama's tenure as president^[269][270]

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.^[271][272] The CBO released a report stating that the stimulus bill increased employment by 1–2.1 million,^{[272][273][274]} while conceding that "it is impossible to determine how many of the reported jobs would have existed in the absence of the stimulus package."^[271] 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.^[275] 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.^[276] 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.^[277]

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.^[278] The compromise overcame opposition from some in both parties, and the resulting $858 billion (equivalent to $1.1 trillion in 2021) 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.^[279]

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.^[280] Obama urged Congress to ratify a 12-nation free trade pact called the Trans-Pacific Partnership.^[281]

Environmental policy

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.^[282] 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.^[283] 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.^[284]

In July 2013, Obama expressed reservations and said he "would reject the Keystone XL pipeline if it increased carbon pollution [or] greenhouse emissions."^[285][286] On February 24, 2015, Obama vetoed a bill that would have authorized the pipeline.^[287] It was the third veto of Obama's presidency and his first major veto.^[288]

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.^{[289][290][291]}

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.^{[292][293][294]}

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.^[295] 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.^[296][297]

Maximum Out-of-Pocket Premium as Percentage of Family Income and federal poverty level, under Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, starting in 2014 (Source: CRS)^[298]

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.^[295] 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.^[299] In March 2009, Obama lifted a ban on using federal funds for stem cell research.^[300]

On November 7, 2009, a health care bill featuring the public option was passed in the House.^[301][302] On December 24, 2009, the Senate passed its own bill—without a public option—on a party-line vote of 60–39.^[303] On March 21, 2010, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) 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.^[304]

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,^[305] 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,^[306] 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.^[307]

Percentage of Individuals in the United States without Health Insurance, 1963–2015 (Source: JAMA)^[308]

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;^[309] 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.^[310] 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.^[311]

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.^[312] 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.^[313]

Foreign policy

June 4, 2009 − after his speech A New Beginning at Cairo University, U.S. President Obama participates in a roundtable interview in 2009 with among others Jamal Khashoggi, Bambang Harymurti and Nahum Barnea.

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.^[314] Obama attempted to reach out to Arab leaders by granting his first interview to an Arab satellite TV network, Al Arabiya.^[315] 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.^[316][317] 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.^[318] On June 26, 2009, Obama condemned the Iranian government's actions towards protesters following Iran's 2009 presidential election.^[319]

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,^[320] while civil liberties advocates described it as a violation of al-Awlaki's constitutional right to due process. The killing led to significant controversy.^[321] His teenage son and young daughter, also Americans, were later killed in separate US military actions, although they were not targeted specifically.^[322][323]

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.^[324][325] In 2016, the Obama administration proposed a series of arms deals with Saudi Arabia worth $115 billion.^[326] 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.^[327]

War in Iraq

On February 27, 2009, Obama announced that combat operations in Iraq would end within 18 months.^[328] 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.^[329][330] On August 31, 2010, Obama announced that the United States combat mission in Iraq was over.^[331] On October 21, 2011, President Obama announced that all U.S. troops would leave Iraq in time to be "home for the holidays."^[332]

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.^[333][334] In August 2014, during the Sinjar massacre, Obama ordered a campaign of U.S. airstrikes against ISIL.^[335] By the end of 2014, 3,100 American ground troops were committed to the conflict^[336] and 16,000 sorties were flown over the battlefield, primarily by U.S. Air Force and Navy pilots.^[337] 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,^[338] and by July American-led coalition air forces counted 44,000 sorties over the battlefield.^[339]

Afghanistan and Pakistan

Obama after a trilateral meeting with Afghan President Hamid Karzai (left) and Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari (right), May 2009

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,^[340] the region he cites as being most likely where an attack against the United States could be launched again.^[341] 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."^[342] 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.^[343] 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;^[344] 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.^[345] 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.^[346] In October 2015, the White House announced a plan to keep U.S. Forces in Afghanistan indefinitely in light of the deteriorating security situation.^[347]

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."^[348]

Death of Osama bin Laden

Obama and members of the national security team receive an update on Operation Neptune's Spear in the White House Situation Room, May 1, 2011. See also: Situation Room.

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.^[349] CIA head Leon Panetta reported this intelligence to President Obama in March 2011.^[349] 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.^[349] 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.^[350][351] DNA testing was one of five methods used to positively identify bin Laden's corpse,^[352] which was buried at sea several hours later.^[353] 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.^[350][354] Reaction to the announcement was positive across party lines, including from former presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.^[355]

Relations with Cuba

President Obama meeting with Cuban President Raúl Castro in Panama, April 2015

Since the spring of 2013, secret meetings were conducted between the United States and Cuba in the neutral locations of Canada and Vatican City.^[356] The Vatican first became involved in 2013 when Pope Francis advised the U.S. and Cuba to exchange prisoners as a gesture of goodwill.^[357] 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.^[358]

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.^[359] Popularly dubbed the Cuban Thaw, The New Republic deemed the Cuban Thaw to be "Obama's finest foreign policy achievement."^[360] 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.^[361] The countries' respective "interests sections" in one another's capitals were upgraded to embassies on July 20 and August 13, 2015, respectively.^[362] Obama visited Havana, Cuba for two days in March 2016, becoming the first sitting U.S. president to arrive since Calvin Coolidge in 1928.^[363]

Israel

Obama meeting with Israeli President Shimon Peres in the Oval Office, May 2009

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.^[364] 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.^[365] 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.^[366][367] In 2011, the United States vetoed a Security Council resolution condemning Israeli settlements, with the United States being the only nation to do so.^[368] Obama supports the two-state solution to the Arab–Israeli conflict based on the 1967 borders with land swaps.^[369]

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."^[370] 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."^[371] Obama expressed support for Israel's right to defend itself during the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict.^[372] 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."^[373]

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.^[374] Netanyahu strongly criticized the Obama administration's actions,^[375][376] and the Israeli government withdrew its annual dues from the organization, which totaled $6 million, on January 6, 2017.^[377] On January 5, 2017, the United States House of Representatives voted 342–80 to condemn the UN Resolution.^[378][379]

Libya

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^[380] passed unanimously by the U.S. Senate.^[381] 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^[382]—announced an immediate cessation of military activities.^[383]

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,^[384] including the use of Tomahawk missiles, B-2 Spirits, and fighter jets.^{[385][386][387]} 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.^[388] Some Representatives^[389] questioned whether Obama had the constitutional authority to order military action in addition to questioning its cost, structure and aftermath.^[390][391] Obama later expressed regret for playing a leading role in the destabilization of Libya, calling the certain situation there "a mess."^[392] He has stated that the lack of preparation surrounding the days following the government's overthrow was the "worst mistake" of his presidency.^[393]

Syrian civil war

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."^[394] This stance was reaffirmed in November 2015.^[395] In 2012, Obama authorized multiple programs run by the CIA and the Pentagon to train anti-Assad rebels.^[396] The Pentagon-run program was later found to have failed and was formally abandoned in October 2015.^[397][398]

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^[399] 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.^[400][401] In 2014, Obama authorized an air campaign aimed primarily at ISIL.^[402]

Iran nuclear talks

Obama talks with Benjamin Netanyahu, March 2013.

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. The administration built new plutonium pits at the Los Alamos lab in New Mexico and expanded enriched uranium processing at the Y-12 facility in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. 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.^{[403][404][405]} 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."^[406] 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.^[407][408] 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.^[409]

Russia

Obama meets Russian President Vladimir Putin in September 2015.

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.^[410] Obama and Medvedev signed the New START treaty in April 2010, and the U.S. Senate ratified it in December 2010.^[411] In December 2011, Obama instructed agencies to consider LGBT rights when issuing financial aid to foreign countries.^[412] In August 2013, he criticized Russia's law that discriminates against gays,^[413] but he stopped short of advocating a boycott of the upcoming 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia.^[414]

After Russia's invasion of Crimea in 2014, military intervention in Syria in 2015, and the interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election,^[415] 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.^[416]

Discover more about Presidency (2009–2017) related topics

Presidency of Barack Obama

Presidency of Barack Obama

Barack Obama's tenure as the 44th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 2009, and ended on January 20, 2017. A Democrat from Illinois, Obama took office following a decisive victory over Republican nominee John McCain in the 2008 presidential election. Four years later, in the 2012 presidential election, he defeated Republican nominee Mitt Romney to win re-election. Obama is the first African American president, the first multiracial president, the first non-white president, and the first president born in Hawaii.

First 100 days of Barack Obama's presidency

First 100 days of Barack Obama's presidency

The first 100 days of Barack Obama's presidency began on January 20, 2009, the day Barack Obama was inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States. The first 100 days of a presidential term took on symbolic significance during Franklin D. Roosevelt's first term in office, and the period is considered a benchmark to measure the early success of a president. The 100th day of his presidency ended at noon on April 30, 2009. Obama stated that he should not be judged just by his first hundred days: "The first hundred days is going to be important, but it’s probably going to be the first thousand days that makes the difference." Obama began to formally create his presidential footprint during his first 100 days. Obama quickly began attempting to foster support for his economic stimulus package, American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. The bill passed in the House on January 28, 2009, by a 244–188 vote, and it passed in the Senate on February 10 by a 61–37 margin.

Chief Justice of the United States

Chief Justice of the United States

The chief justice of the United States is the chief judge of the Supreme Court of the United States and the highest-ranking officer of the U.S. federal judiciary. Article II, Section 2, Clause 2 of the U.S. Constitution grants plenary power to the president of the United States to nominate, and with the advice and consent of the United States Senate, appoint "Judges of the supreme Court", who serve until they resign, retire, are impeached and convicted, or die. The existence of a chief justice is explicit in Article One, Section 3, Clause 6 which states that the chief justice shall preside on the impeachment trial of the president.

John Roberts

John Roberts

John Glover Roberts Jr. is an American lawyer and jurist who has served as the 17th chief justice of the United States since 2005. He has been described as having a conservative judicial philosophy but, above all, being an institutionalist. He has shown a willingness to work with the Supreme Court's liberal bloc, and, after the retirement of Anthony Kennedy in 2018, he has been regarded as the primary swing vote on the Court. However, Roberts is no longer regarded as the Court's median vote following the replacement of Ruth Bader Ginsburg by Amy Coney Barrett in 2020; Brett Kavanaugh is now considered to have this role.

First inauguration of Barack Obama

First inauguration of Barack Obama

The first inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th president of the United States took place on Tuesday, January 20, 2009, at the West Front of the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C. The 56th inauguration, which set a record attendance for any event held in the city, marked the commencement of the first term of Barack Obama as president and Joe Biden as vice president. Based on combined attendance numbers, television viewership, and Internet traffic, it was one of the most-observed events ever by the global audience.

Executive order

Executive order

In the United States, an executive order is a directive by the president of the United States that manages operations of the federal government. The legal or constitutional basis for executive orders has multiple sources. Article Two of the United States Constitution gives presidents broad executive and enforcement authority to use their discretion to determine how to enforce the law or to otherwise manage the resources and staff of the executive branch. The ability to make such orders is also based on expressed or implied Acts of Congress that delegate to the president some degree of discretionary power. The vast majority of executive orders are proposed by federal agencies before being issued by the president.

Guantanamo Bay detention camp

Guantanamo Bay detention camp

The Guantanamo Bay detention camp is a United States military prison occupied within Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, also referred to as Guantánamo, GTMO, and Gitmo, on the coast of Guantánamo Bay in Cuba. Of the roughly 780 people detained there since January 2002 when the military prison first opened after the September 11 attacks, 740 have been transferred elsewhere, 31 remain there, and 9 have died while in custody.

George W. Bush

George W. Bush

George Walker Bush is an American retired politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party and the Bush family, he previously served as the 46th governor of Texas from 1995 to 2000.

Mexico City policy

Mexico City policy

The Mexico City policy, sometimes referred to by its critics as the global gag rule, is a former United States government policy that blocked U.S. federal funding for non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that provided abortion counseling or referrals, advocated to decriminalize abortion, or expanded abortion services. When in effect, the Mexico City policy is a U.S. government policy that requires foreign non-governmental organizations to certify that they will not "perform or actively promote abortion as a method of family planning" with non-U.S. funds as a condition for receiving U.S. global family planning assistance, and during its January 23, 2017 implementation any other U.S. global health assistance, including U.S. global HIV and maternal and child health (MCH) assistance.

Family planning

Family planning

Family planning is the consideration of the number of children a person wishes to have, including the choice to have no children, and the age at which they wish to have them. Things that may play a role on family planning decisions include marital situation, career or work considerations, financial situations. If sexually active, family planning may involve the use of contraception and other techniques to control the timing of reproduction.

Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009

Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009

The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009 is a landmark federal statute in the United States that was the first bill signed into law by U.S. President Barack Obama on January 29, 2009. The act amends Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and states that the 180-day statute of limitations for filing an equal-pay lawsuit regarding pay discrimination resets with each new paycheck affected by that discriminatory action. The law directly addressed Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. (2007), a U.S. Supreme Court decision that the statute of limitations for presenting an equal-pay lawsuit begins on the date that the employer makes the initial discriminatory wage decision, not at the date of the most recent paycheck.

Embryonic stem cell

Embryonic stem cell

Embryonic stem cells (ESCs) are pluripotent stem cells derived from the inner cell mass of a blastocyst, an early-stage pre-implantation embryo. Human embryos reach the blastocyst stage 4–5 days post fertilization, at which time they consist of 50–150 cells. Isolating the inner cell mass (embryoblast) using immunosurgery results in destruction of the blastocyst, a process which raises ethical issues, including whether or not embryos at the pre-implantation stage have the same moral considerations as embryos in the post-implantation stage of development.

Graph of Obama's approval ratings per Gallup

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.^[417] 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."^[418] 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."^[419] Additionally, Obama has frequently been referred to as an exceptional orator.^[420] During his pre-inauguration transition period and continuing into his presidency, Obama delivered a series of weekly Internet video addresses.^[421]

According to the Gallup Organization, Obama began his presidency with a 68 percent approval rating^[422] before gradually declining for the rest of the year, and eventually bottoming out at 41 percent in August 2010,^[423] a trend similar to Ronald Reagan's and Bill Clinton's first years in office.^[424] He experienced a small poll bounce shortly after the death of Osama bin Laden on May 2, 2011. This bounce lasted until around June 2011, when his approval numbers dropped back to where they were previously.^[425][426] His approval ratings rebounded around the same time as his reelection in 2012, with polls showing an average job approval of 52 percent shortly after his second inauguration.^[427] Despite approval ratings dropping to 39 percent in late-2013 due to the ACA roll-out, they climbed to 50 percent in January 2015 according to Gallup.^[428] Polls showed strong support for Obama in other countries both before and during his presidency.^{[429][430][431]} 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.^[432] 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.^[433][434]

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,"^[435] which drew a mixture of praise and criticism from world leaders and media figures.^{[436][437][438][439]} 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.^[440]

Discover more about Cultural and political image related topics

Public image of Barack Obama

Public image of Barack Obama

Barack Obama, who served as the 44th President of the United States, has elicited a number of public perceptions regarding his personality and background. As the first African-American President of the United States, his race and culture played a prominent role, both positively and negatively.

International reactions to the 2012 United States presidential election

International reactions to the 2012 United States presidential election

As a result of incumbent U.S. President Barack Obama's re-election victory over Mitt Romney reaction emanated from across the world including states and other institutions. Several U.S. embassies around the world held mock elections and hosted parties in watching the final result trickle through. Obama made his first foreign trip after the election day success at the end of November when he visited Cambodia for the 2012 ASEAN summit amidst his foreign policy outlook shift to East Asia. On the same trip, he became the first ever U.S. president to visit Myanmar. Global popular sentiment was generally in favor of Obama with the exception of Chile, Pakistan and, speculatively, Iran. Financial markets responded with mixed reactions to the result while the international news media reacted to specific issues surrounding the election.

Ivy League

Ivy League

The Ivy League is an American collegiate athletic conference comprising eight private research universities in the Northeastern United States. The term Ivy League is typically used beyond the sports context to refer to the eight schools as a group of elite colleges with connotations of academic excellence, selectivity in admissions, and social elitism. Its members are Brown University, Columbia University, Cornell University, Dartmouth College, Harvard University, Princeton University, University of Pennsylvania, and Yale University.

Civil rights movement

Civil rights movement

The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized racial segregation, discrimination, and disenfranchisement throughout the United States. The movement had its origins in the Reconstruction era during the late 19th century, although it made its largest legislative gains in the 1960s after years of direct actions and grassroots protests. The social movement's major nonviolent resistance and civil disobedience campaigns eventually secured new protections in federal law for the civil rights of all Americans.

National Association of Black Journalists

National Association of Black Journalists

The National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ) is an organization of African-American journalists, students, and media professionals. Founded in 1975 in Washington, D.C., by 44 journalists, the NABJ's stated purpose is to provide quality programs and services to and advocate on behalf of black journalists. The organization has worked for diversity and to increase the number of minorities in newsrooms across the country.

Ronald Reagan

Ronald Reagan

Ronald Wilson Reagan was an American politician and actor who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He previously served as the 33rd governor of California from 1967 to 1975 and as president of the Screen Actors Guild from 1947 to 1952 and from 1959 until 1960.

Bill Clinton

Bill Clinton

William Jefferson Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. He previously served as governor of Arkansas from 1979 to 1981 and again from 1983 to 1992, and as attorney general of Arkansas from 1977 to 1979. A member of the Democratic Party, Clinton became known as a New Democrat, as many of his policies reflected a centrist "Third Way" political philosophy. He is the husband of Hillary Clinton, who was a U.S. senator from New York from 2001 to 2009, secretary of state from 2009 to 2013 and the Democratic nominee for president in the 2016 presidential election.

France 24

France 24

France 24 is a French state-owned international news television network based in Paris. Its channels broadcast in French, English, Arabic, and Spanish and are aimed at the overseas market.

International Herald Tribune

International Herald Tribune

The International Herald Tribune (IHT) was a daily English-language newspaper published in Paris, France for international English-speaking readers. It had the aim of becoming "the world's first global newspaper" and could fairly be said to have met that goal. It published under the name International Herald Tribune from 1967 to 2013, but its origins as an international newspaper traces back to 1887.

Norwegian Nobel Committee

Norwegian Nobel Committee

The Norwegian Nobel Committee selects the recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize each year on behalf of Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel's estate, based on instructions of Nobel's will.

2009 Nobel Peace Prize

2009 Nobel Peace Prize

The 2009 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to United States President Barack Obama for his "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples". The Norwegian Nobel Committee announced the award on October 9, 2009, citing Obama's promotion of nuclear nonproliferation and a "new climate" in international relations fostered by Obama, especially in reaching out to the Muslim world.

Obama playing golf with the Argentinian president Mauricio Macri, October 2017

Obama's presidency ended on January 20, 2017, upon the inauguration of his successor, Donald Trump.^[441][442] The family moved to a house they rented in Kalorama, Washington, D.C.^[443] 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."^[444] 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.^[445] 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.^[446] From October 31 to November 1, Obama hosted the inaugural summit of the Obama Foundation,^[447] which he intended for it 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.^[448]

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.^[449][450] Higher Ground's first film, American Factory, won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature in 2020.^[451] 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.^[452]

In 2019, Barack and Michelle Obama bought a home on Martha's Vineyard from Wyc Grousbeck.^[453] On October 29, Obama criticized "wokeness" and call-out culture at the Obama Foundation's annual summit.^[454][455]

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.^[456] 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."^[457][458] 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."^[459] On November 17, Obama's presidential memoir, A Promised Land, was released.^{[460][461][462]}

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.'"^[463][464] 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.^[465]

Obama with president Joe Biden and vice president Kamala Harris in the White House, April 5, 2022

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.^[466] 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.^{[467][468][469]} In June, it was announced that the Obamas and their podcast production company, Higher Ground, signed a multi-year deal with Audible.^[470][471] In September, Obama visited the White House to unveil his and Michelle's official White House portraits.^[472] Around the same time, he won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Narrator^[473] for his narration in the Netflix documentary series Our Great National Parks.^[474]

Discover more about Post-presidency (2017–present) related topics

Mauricio Macri

Mauricio Macri

Mauricio Macri is an Argentine businessman and politician who served as the President of Argentina from 2015 to 2019. He has been the leader of the Republican Proposal (PRO) party since its founding in 2005. He previously served as 5th Chief of Government of Buenos Aires from 2007 to 2015, and was a member of the Chamber of Deputies representing Buenos Aires from 2005 to 2007. Ideologically, he identifies himself as a liberal and conservative on the Argentine centre-right.

Inauguration of Donald Trump

Inauguration of Donald Trump

The inauguration of Donald Trump as the 45th president of the United States marked the commencement of Donald Trump's term as president and Mike Pence's term as vice president. An estimated 300,000 to 600,000 people attended the public ceremony held on Friday, January 20, 2017, at the West Front of the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C.

Donald Trump

Donald Trump

Donald John Trump is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.

John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum is the presidential library and museum of John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1917–1963), the 35th president of the United States (1961–1963). It is located on Columbia Point in the Dorchester neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts, next to the University of Massachusetts at Boston, the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate, and the Massachusetts Archives and Commonwealth Museum. Designed by the architect I. M. Pei, the building is the official repository for original papers and correspondence of the Kennedy Administration, as well as special bodies of published and unpublished materials, such as books and papers by and about Ernest Hemingway.

Hurricane Harvey

Hurricane Harvey

Hurricane Harvey was a devastating Category 4 hurricane that made landfall on Texas and Louisiana in August 2017, causing catastrophic flooding and more than 100 deaths. It is tied with 2005's Hurricane Katrina as the costliest tropical cyclone on record, inflicting $125 billion in damage, primarily from catastrophic rainfall-triggered flooding in the Houston metropolitan area and Southeast Texas; this made the storm the costliest natural disaster recorded in Texas at the time. It was the first major hurricane to make landfall in the United States since Wilma in 2005, ending a record 12-year span in which no hurricanes made landfall at the intensity of a major hurricane throughout the country. In a four-day period, many areas received more than 40 inches (1,000 mm) of rain as the system slowly meandered over eastern Texas and adjacent waters, causing unprecedented flooding. With peak accumulations of 60.58 in (1,539 mm), in Nederland, Texas, Harvey was the wettest tropical cyclone on record in the United States. The resulting floods inundated hundreds of thousands of homes, which displaced more than 30,000 people and prompted more than 17,000 rescues.

Hurricane Irma

Hurricane Irma

Hurricane Irma was an extremely powerful Cape Verde hurricane that caused widespread destruction across its path in September 2017. Irma was the first Category 5 hurricane to strike the Leeward Islands on record, followed by Maria two weeks later. At the time, it was considered the most powerful hurricane on record in the open Atlantic region, outside of the Caribbean Sea and Gulf of Mexico, until it was surpassed by Hurricane Dorian two years later. It was also the third-strongest Atlantic hurricane at landfall ever recorded, just behind the 1935 Labor Day Hurricane and Dorian.

Gulf Coast of the United States

Gulf Coast of the United States

The Gulf Coast of the United States, also known as the Gulf South or the South Coast, is the coastline along the Southern United States where they meet the Gulf of Mexico. The coastal states that have a shoreline on the Gulf of Mexico are Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida, and these are known as the Gulf States.

Obama Foundation

Obama Foundation

The Barack Obama Foundation is a Chicago-based nonprofit organization founded in 2014. It oversees the creation of the Barack Obama Presidential Center, runs the My Brother's Keeper Alliance, and operates a scholarship program through the University of Chicago's Harris School of Public Policy.

Netflix

Netflix

Netflix, Inc. is an American media company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it operates the over-the-top subscription video on-demand service Netflix brand, which includes original films and television series commissioned or acquired by the company, and third-party content licensed from other distributors. Netflix is a member of the Motion Picture Association—having become the first streaming company to become a member.

Higher Ground Productions

Higher Ground Productions

Higher Ground Productions, also known simply as Higher Ground, is an American production company founded in 2018 by former United States President Barack Obama and former First Lady Michelle Obama.

American Factory

American Factory

American Factory is a 2019 American documentary film directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, about Chinese company Fuyao's factory in Moraine, a city near Dayton, Ohio, that occupies Moraine Assembly, a shuttered General Motors plant. The film had its festival premiere at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival. It is distributed by Netflix and is the first film acquired by Barack and Michelle Obama's production company, Higher Ground Productions. It won an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.

Martha's Vineyard

Martha's Vineyard

Martha's Vineyard, often simply called the Vineyard, is an island in the Northeastern United States, located south of Cape Cod in Dukes County, Massachusetts, known for being a popular, affluent summer colony. Martha's Vineyard includes the smaller adjacent Chappaquiddick Island, which is usually connected to the Vineyard. The two islands have sometimes been separated by storms and hurricanes, which last occurred from 2007 to 2015. It is the 58th largest island in the U.S., with a land area of about 96 square miles (250 km2), and the third-largest on the East Coast, after Long Island and Mount Desert Island. Martha's Vineyard constitutes the bulk of Dukes County, which also includes the Elizabeth Islands and the island of Nomans Land.

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." Zelizer 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. Zelizer 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." Zelizer calls this the "defining paradox of Obama’s presidency".^[475]

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."^[476] 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".^[477]

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.^[478] However, in 2017, the penalty for violating the individual mandate was repealed effective 2019.^[479] 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.^{[480][481][482][483]}

Many commentators credit Obama with averting a threatened depression and pulling the economy back from the Great Recession.^[478] 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 term.^[484] In 2010, Obama signed into effect the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. Passed as a response to the financial crisis of 2007–2008, 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.^[485]

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.^[486]

As president, Obama advanced LGBT rights.^[487] 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 LGB people; the law went into effect the following year.^[488] In 2016, his administration brought an end to the ban on transgender people serving openly in the U.S. armed forces.^[489][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.^[490]

Obama substantially escalated the use of drone strikes against suspected militants and terrorists associated with al-Qaeda and the Taliban.^[491] In 2016, the last year of his presidency, the U.S. dropped 26,171 bombs on seven different countries.^[492][493] 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.^[494]

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.^[495]

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.^[496][497] He gained 10 spots from the same survey in 2015 from the Brookings Institution that ranked him the 18th-greatest American president.^[498] In Gallup's 2018 job approval poll for the past 10 U.S. presidents, he received a 63 percent approval rating.^[499]

Presidential library

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.^[500]

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Julian E. Zelizer

Julian E. Zelizer

Julian Emanuel Zelizer is a professor of political history and an author in the United States at Princeton University. Zelizer has authored or co-authored several books about American political history; his focuses of study are the second half of the 20th century and the 21st century.

American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009

American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), nicknamed the Recovery Act, was a stimulus package enacted by the 111th U.S. Congress and signed into law by President Barack Obama in February 2009. Developed in response to the Great Recession, the primary objective of this federal statute was to save existing jobs and create new ones as soon as possible. Other objectives were to provide temporary relief programs for those most affected by the recession and invest in infrastructure, education, health, and renewable energy.

Great Recession in the United States

Great Recession in the United States

In the United States, the Great Recession was a severe financial crisis combined with a deep recession. While the recession officially lasted from December 2007 to June 2009, it took many years for the economy to recover to pre-crisis levels of employment and output. This slow recovery was due in part to households and financial institutions paying off debts accumulated in the years preceding the crisis along with restrained government spending following initial stimulus efforts. It followed the bursting of the housing bubble, the housing market correction and subprime mortgage crisis.

Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act

Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act

The Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, commonly referred to as Dodd–Frank, is a United States federal law that was enacted on July 21, 2010. The law overhauled financial regulation in the aftermath of the Great Recession, and it made changes affecting all federal financial regulatory agencies and almost every part of the nation's financial services industry.

Affordable Care Act

Affordable Care Act

The Affordable Care Act (ACA), formally known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and colloquially known as Obamacare, is a landmark U.S. federal statute enacted by the 111th United States Congress and signed into law by President Barack Obama on March 23, 2010. Together with the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010 amendment, it represents the U.S. healthcare system's most significant regulatory overhaul and expansion of coverage since the enactment of Medicare and Medicaid in 1965.

Brookings Institution

Brookings Institution

The Brookings Institution, often stylized as simply Brookings, is an American research group founded in 1916. Located on Think Tank Row in Washington, D.C., the organization conducts research and education in the social sciences, primarily in economics, metropolitan policy, governance, foreign policy, global economy, and economic development.

Medicare (United States)

Medicare (United States)

Medicare is a government national health insurance program in the United States, begun in 1965 under the Social Security Administration (SSA) and now administered by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). It primarily provides health insurance for Americans aged 65 and older, but also for some younger people with disability status as determined by the SSA, including people with end stage renal disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

Medicaid

Medicaid

In the United States, Medicaid is a program that provides health insurance for some people with limited income and resources. The program is partially funded and primarily managed by state governments, which also have wide latitude in determining eligibility and benefits, but the federal government sets baseline standards for state Medicaid programs and provides a significant portion of their funding.

Great Recession

Great Recession

The Great Recession was a period of marked general decline, i.e., a recession, observed in national economies globally that occurred from late 2007 to 2009. The scale and timing of the recession varied from country to country. At the time, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) concluded that it was the most severe economic and financial meltdown since the Great Depression. One result was a serious disruption of normal international relations.

First inauguration of Barack Obama

First inauguration of Barack Obama

The first inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th president of the United States took place on Tuesday, January 20, 2009, at the West Front of the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C. The 56th inauguration, which set a record attendance for any event held in the city, marked the commencement of the first term of Barack Obama as president and Joe Biden as vice president. Based on combined attendance numbers, television viewership, and Internet traffic, it was one of the most-observed events ever by the global audience.

Financial regulation

Financial regulation

Financial regulation is a form of regulation or supervision, which subjects financial institutions to certain requirements, restrictions and guidelines, aiming to maintain the stability and integrity of the financial system. This may be handled by either a government or non-government organization. Financial regulation has also influenced the structure of banking sectors by increasing the variety of financial products available. Financial regulation forms one of three legal categories which constitutes the content of financial law, the other two being market practices and case law.

Great Depression

Great Depression

The Great Depression (1929–1939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagion began around September and led to the Wall Street stock market crash of October 24. It was the longest, deepest, and most widespread depression of the 20th century.