Nevertheless, in 2008 he was elected over Arizona Senator John McCain by 365 to 173 electoral votes.Īs an incoming president, Obama faced many challenges-an economic collapse, wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the continuing menace of terrorism. Some pundits instantly pronounced him a future president, but most did not expect it to happen for some time. At the Democratic National Convention that summer, he delivered a much acclaimed keynote address. Obama was elected to the Illinois Senate in 1996, and then to the U.S. Their daughters, Malia and Sasha, were born in 19, respectively. In 1992, Obama married Michelle Robinson, a lawyer who had also excelled at Harvard Law. Returning to Chicago, he joined a small law firm specializing in civil rights. In 1988, he went to Harvard Law School, where he attracted national attention as the first African American president of the Harvard Law Review. Following graduation in 1983, Obama worked in New York City, then became a community organizer on the South Side of Chicago, coordinating with churches to improve housing conditions and set up job-training programs in a community hit hard by steel mill closures. After two years at Occidental College in Los Angeles, he transferred to Columbia University, where he studied political science and international relations. In his memoir Dreams from My Father (1995), Obama describes the complexities of discovering his identity in adolescence.

Before fifth grade, he returned to Honolulu to live with his maternal grandparents and attend Punahou School on scholarship. They later divorced, and Barack’s mother married a man from Indonesia, where he spent his early childhood. Obama’s father, Barack Sr., a Kenyan economist, met his mother, Stanley Ann Dunham, when both were students in Hawaii, where Barack was born on August 4, 1961. Subject to the prejudices of their time-many of them owned slaves-most would not have foreseen an African American president. The framers of the Constitution always hoped that our leadership would not be limited to Americans of wealth or family connections. When Barack Obama was elected president in 2008, he became the first African American to hold the office. His story is the American story - values from the heartland, a middle-class upbringing in a strong family, hard work and education as the means of getting ahead, and the conviction that a life so blessed should be lived in service to others. Get Involved Show submenu for “Get Involved””īarack Obama served as the 44th President of the United States.The White House Show submenu for “The White House””.Office of the United States Trade Representative.Office of Science and Technology Policy.Executive Offices Show submenu for “Executive Offices””.Administration Show submenu for “Administration””.

Obama the world after america