Barack Obama



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

Career
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.Obama chose to stay in Hawaii when his mother and half-sister returned to Indonesia in 1975. After graduating from high school in 1979, Obama moved to Los Angeles to attend Occidental College on a full scholarship. In late 1981, he transferred to Columbia University in New York City as a junior, where he majored in political science. Obama graduated from Columbia University in 1983.

Obama moved to Chicago where he worked as a community organizer from June 1985 to May 1988. In 1988, he enrolled in Harvard Law School, where he was the first black president of the Harvard Law Review. After graduating, he became a civil rights attorney and an academic, teaching constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School from 1992 to 2004. Barack Obama also represented the 13th district in the Illinois Senate from 1997 until 2004.

In 2008, Obama was nominated by the Democratic Party for president. Obama was elected over Republican nominee John McCain in the general election and was inaugurated alongside his running mate Joe Biden on January 20, 2009.

After winning re-election by defeating Republican opponent Mitt Romney, Obama was sworn in for a second term of the US Presidency on January 20, 2013. In foreign policy, he ordered military interventions in Iraq and Syria in response to gains made by ISIL after the 2011 withdrawal from Iraq. Obama initiated sanctions against Russia following the invasion in Ukraine and again after interference in the 2016 U.S. elections.

Obama left office on January 20, 2017, and continues to reside in Washington, D.C. Since leaving office, Obama has remained active in Democratic politics, including campaigning for candidates in the 2018 midterm elections, appearing at the 2020 Democratic National Convention and campaigning for Biden during the 2020 presidential election.