Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961, in Honolulu, Hawaii) is an American politician, attorney, and author who served as the 44th President of the United States from January 20, 2009, to January 20, 2017. He was the first black American to hold the office; the significance of that designation has itself been a subject of public and scholarly discussion. See Obama and Race — Symbolic Significance Viewpoint. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama previously served as a U.S. Senator from Illinois (2005–2008) and as a state senator in the Illinois General Assembly (1997–2004). Before entering electoral politics, he worked as a community organizer, a civil rights attorney, and a lecturer in constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School. Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009, a decision that itself generated significant debate; see Nobel Peace Prize 2009 — Debate. Since leaving office, he has remained publicly active through the Barack Obama Foundation, media production company Higher Ground, and occasional political commentary.

Obama was born to Stanley Ann Dunham, an American from Kansas, and Barack Obama Sr., a Kenyan economist of the Luo people. His parents separated when he was two years old; he was raised primarily by his mother and maternal grandparents in Hawaii. He attended Punahou School in Honolulu, then Occidental College in Los Angeles, before transferring to Columbia University, where he earned a B.A. in political science in 1983. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School in 1991, where he also became the first black American to serve as president of the Harvard Law Review. He married Michelle Robinson in 1992; the couple has two daughters, Malia and Sasha. His memoir Dreams from My Father (1995) described his biracial identity and his search for connection to his Kenyan father's family.

For a full account of Obama's life before the presidency, see Barack Obama — History.

Obama announced his candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination in February 2007. He defeated Senator Hillary Clinton in a protracted primary contest decided largely in the final months of the nominating calendar. In the general election, he defeated Republican nominee Senator John McCain, receiving 365 electoral votes to McCain's 173 and approximately 52.9 percent of the popular vote. The election drew record voter turnout and was widely noted as historic given Obama's background. For a full account of the campaign and results, see 2008 Presidential Election — History.

During and after the campaign, a persistent controversy arose disputing Obama's eligibility for the presidency based on claims about his place of birth; see Obama Birther Controversy — Debate.

Obama sought and won re-election in 2012, defeating Republican nominee Mitt Romney with 332 electoral votes to Romney's 206 and approximately 51.1 percent of the popular vote. The campaign focused heavily on the economy, the Affordable Care Act, and contrasting visions of the role of government. For a full account, see 2012 Presidential Election — History.

Obama's presidency opened amid the global financial crisis of 2008–2009. His administration's early domestic agenda included the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (2009), a large economic stimulus package, and the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (2010), which restructured financial regulation. The most significant domestic legislation of his tenure was the Affordable Care Act (ACA, 2010), a major restructuring of the American health insurance system. The ACA became and remains one of the most contested domestic policy enactments of the early 21st century; see Affordable Care Act — Debate.

In foreign policy, Obama's administration pursued a pivot toward the Asia-Pacific region, negotiated the New START arms reduction treaty with Russia (2010), oversaw the military operation that killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in Pakistan (May 2011), withdrew combat forces from Iraq (2011), negotiated the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) limiting Iran's nuclear program (2015), and normalized diplomatic relations with Cuba (2015). The administration also significantly expanded the use of unmanned aerial vehicle (drone) strikes for counterterrorism targeting, including the targeted killing of U.S. citizen Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen (2011); see U.S. Drone Warfare Program. Domestic intelligence practices, including NSA surveillance programs revealed by Edward Snowden, generated significant legal and civil liberties debate during this period. The administration's handling of the civil war in Syria, including a declared “red line” against chemical weapons use, was also the subject of significant controversy; see Obama Foreign Policy — Debate.

Obama's tenure coincided with the Supreme Court's ruling in //Obergefell v. Hodges// (2015), which established a constitutional right to same-sex marriage, and a period of heightened national debate over policing, race, and criminal justice following high-profile deaths of black Americans in encounters with law enforcement.

After leaving office in January 2017, Obama and his family settled in the Kalorama neighborhood of Washington, D.C. He established the Barack Obama Presidential Center in Chicago, Illinois. Through Higher Ground Productions, he and Michelle Obama entered a content partnership with Netflix and later Spotify. He publicly endorsed Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election and campaigned on his behalf. He has continued to comment on domestic and foreign policy matters, including criticism of the Trump administration and advocacy on climate and democracy issues.

No single scholarly consensus exists on the overall assessment of Obama's presidency. Historians and political scientists have begun retrospective rankings, with results varying significantly by evaluator and methodology. See Obama Presidential Ranking — Consensus Status for a summary of available survey data.

On narrower empirical questions — such as coverage gains under the ACA, drone strike casualty figures, or macroeconomic indicators during his tenure — substantial peer-reviewed and official data exist; see the relevant consensus pages linked under Related Pages below.

Major interpretive viewpoints on Obama and his presidency include:

• Obama Legacy — Progressive Viewpoint: Holds that Obama's presidency represented meaningful progress on healthcare access, LGBTQ rights, and climate policy, but that structural constraints and excessive caution limited bolder reform.
• Obama Legacy — Liberal (Classical) Viewpoint: Assesses Obama primarily through the lens of executive power, civil liberties, and institutional norms, noting both expansions of presidential authority (drone targeting, surveillance) and maintenance of rule-of-law commitments.
• Obama Legacy — Conservative Viewpoint: Emphasizes concerns about the ACA's effects on markets and individual choice, the JCPOA's strategic consequences, executive overreach, and the administration's handling of economic recovery and foreign adversaries.
• Obama Legacy — Libertarian Viewpoint: Focuses critical attention on drone warfare, mass surveillance expansion (including NSA programs revealed by Edward Snowden), deportation policy, and the growth of federal regulatory authority.
• Obama and Race — Symbolic Significance Viewpoint: Addresses the historic nature of his election as the first black American president and debates over what, if anything, it signified about American racial progress or the limits thereof.

• Barack Obama — History
• 2008 Presidential Election — History
• 2012 Presidential Election — History
• Obama Birther Controversy — Debate
• Affordable Care Act
• Affordable Care Act — Debate
• Obama Foreign Policy — Debate
• Nobel Peace Prize 2009 — Debate
• Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (Iran Nuclear Deal)
• U.S. Drone Warfare Program
• Obergefell v. Hodges
• Obama Presidential Ranking — Consensus Status
• NSA Surveillance Program
• United States Presidency

1. Barack Obama Presidential Library, “President Barack Obama,” obamalibrary.gov. https://www.obamalibrary.gov/obamas/president-barack-obama
2. Encyclopædia Britannica, “Barack Obama,” britannica.com. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Barack-Obama
3. Nobel Prize Committee, “The Nobel Peace Prize 2009,” nobelprize.org. https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2009/obama/facts/
4. Obama, Barack. Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance. Times Books, 1995.
5. Obama, Barack. The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream. Crown Publishers, 2006.
6. Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, Pub. L. 111-148, 124 Stat. 119 (2010).
7. Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, Pub. L. 111-203 (2010).
8. Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), Vienna, July 14, 2015.
9. Council on Foreign Relations, “Obama's Final Drone Strike Data,” cfr.org, January 20, 2017. https://www.cfr.org/blog/obamas-final-drone-strike-data
10. Obergefell v. Hodges, 576 U.S. 644 (2015).
11. American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, Pub. L. 111-5 (2009).
12. Federal Election Commission, Official 2008 Presidential Election Results. https://www.fec.gov/resources/cms-content/documents/federalelections2008.pdf
13. Federal Election Commission, Official 2012 Presidential Election Results. https://www.fec.gov/resources/cms-content/documents/federalelections2012.pdf