19 photos of Barack Obama’s life as he hits 64 – from youthful senator to Trump laughter
A timeline of Barack Obama’s time as president to now as he celebrates his birthday.
Former President Barack Obama turns 64 today and continues to stay busy despite being nearly a decade out of the White House.
The Democrat has dedicated his life to supporting the next generation of leaders through his work with The Obama Foundation alongside wife, Michelle Obama.
The former first lady recently gushed about her husband while sitting down with her brother, Craig Robinson.
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“There hasn’t been one moment in our marriage where I’ve thought about quitting on my man,” Michelle Obama said, amid rumors that she and Barack were going through a divorce.
“We’ve had some really hard times and we’ve had a lot of fun times, a lot of adventures, and I have become a better person because of the man I’m married to.”
Senator Obama
Barack Obama, then a senator for Illinois, addressed the Building and Construction Trades Department on April 20, 2005.During the November 2004 general election, Obama won the Senate seat with 70 percent of the vote, the largest margin of victoriy for a Senate candidate in the state’s history.
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On the campaign trail
Barack and Michelle Obama stand together during a campaign rally on October 21, 2008, in Miami, Florida.Obama announced his candidacy for President on February 10, 2007, which resulted in him taking on Arizona Senator John McCain.
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Calm before the storm
Obama waves at the crowd at a rally at the University of Cincinnati on November 2, 2008, just two days before election night.He walked away with the win, earning 365 electoral votes to McCain’s 173, making him the first African-American to be elected president.
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Hello, Mr. President
Barack Obama was sworn in as the 44th President of the United States on January 20th, 2009, by Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts.Both Roberts and Obama made several mistakes as they recited the oath of office, resulting in a second oath ceremony at the White House the next day.
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The First Family
Barack and Michelle Obama with their daughters, Sasha and Malia, in an official family portrait in the Green Room of the White House.Malia was the youngest child to live in the White House since John F. Kennedy Jr. in 1961.
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President Obama
The official portrait of Barack Obama in 2009. During his first 100 days as president, Obama ordered the closure of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp, lifted the 7½-year ban on federal funding for stem cell research, and promoted equal pay regardless of gender, race, or age.”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 said in an interview days before winning the presidency.
(Image: Photo12/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)6 of 19
Hitting the green
President Obama and Vice President Joe Biden at the White House putting green on April 24, 2009.Biden and Obama initially ran against each other during the 2008 Democratic Primaries until the latter dropped out following the Iowa caucus. Obama picked Biden as his running mate, calling him “decent, honest, and loyal.”
(Image: Getty Images)
Former President Barack Obama turns 64 today and continues to stay busy despite being nearly a decade out of the White House.
The Democrat has dedicated his life to supporting the next generation of leaders through his work with The Obama Foundation alongside wife, Michelle Obama.
The former first lady recently gushed about her husband while sitting down with her brother, Craig Robinson.
Trump fails to finish sentence over Lara Trump – with people begging for answers
Trump makes ‘disturbing remarks’ about his 1-year-old daughter in resurfaced clip
“There hasn’t been one moment in our marriage where I’ve thought about quitting on my man,” Michelle Obama said, amid rumors that she and Barack were going through a divorce.
“We’ve had some really hard times and we’ve had a lot of fun times, a lot of adventures, and I have become a better person because of the man I’m married to.”
The Obamas in London
Barack and Michelle Obama walk with Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace on May 24, 2011. The Queen and Obama had a special relationship that often went beyond the rigid protocol set by the Crown.”Like so many, Michelle and I are grateful to have witnessed Her Majesty’s dedicated leadership, and we are awed by her legacy of tireless, dignified public service,” the Obamas said in a statement following the Queen’s death in 2022.
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Back to the grind
Obama locks hands with former President Bill Clinton at a campaign rally on November 3, 2012, days before he battled it out against former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney.Obama secured the presidency once again with 332 electoral votes and won 51.1 percent of the popular vote, becoming the first Democratic president since Franklin D. Roosevelt to win the popular vote twice.
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Two terms
Barack Obama took the oath of office for his second term on January 21, 2013. The ceremony came on the heels of the 150th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation.Obama was sworn in using two bibles used by Lincoln and Martin Luther King Jr.
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The president in action
President Obama and Vice President Biden speak from the State Dining Room of the White House on May 21, 2013, after a massive tornado ripped through several neighborhoods in Oklahoma, killing 24 people.At the time, Obama declared a major disaster in Moore, Oklahoma, ordering federal aid to the city to allow recovery efforts to begin.
(Image: AFP/Getty Images)
‘Zot, Zot, Zot!’
President Obama mimicking the Anteater, the mascot for the University of California-Irvine, while delivering that year’s commencement address on June 14, 2014.”Hope is the fact that, today, the single largest age group in America is 22 years old, who are all just itching to reshape this country and reshape the world,” said Obama at the time. “And I cannot wait to see what you do tomorrow.”
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A Pope and a President
Pope Francis and President Obama share a laugh at the Andrews Air Force Base on September 22, 2015.After Francis’ death in 2025, the Obamas described him as “the rare leader who made us want to be better people.”
“May we continue to heed his call to ‘never remain on the sidelines of this march of living hope.'”
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Girl dad
Obama hugs his eldest daughter, Malia, at the Fourth of July White House party on July 4, 2016. The event was also Malia’s 18th birthday.Since leaving the White House, Malia graduated from Harvard University and worked as a write on the Amazon Prime Video series Swarm in 2023. She also wrote the short film, The Heart, which was screened at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival.
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Back on the campaign trail
Michelle and Barack Obama embrace while campaigning for Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on November 7, 2016.Clinton ultimately lost to Donald Trump, with the latter receiving 304 electoral votes. Obama said later that month that the election results “accurately reflect the will of the American people.”
(Image: LightRocket via Getty Images)
Welcoming the new president
Former President Barack Obama speaks with Donald Trump shortly after he was sworn in on January 20, 2017.The inauguration drew a crowd of roughly 600,000 attendees, a drop from the more than one million people who attended Obama’s second inauguration.
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Immortalized in art
Obama stands alongside his portrait, painted by Kehinde Wiley in 2018 for the National Portrait Gallery.”How about that? That’s pretty sharp,” the former president said during the unveiling ceremony.
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Supporting Joe
Barack Obama smiles while speaking at a drive-in campaign rally for then-Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden on October 31, 2020. Biden campaigned using drive-in rallies during the COVID-19 pandemic.”With Joe and Kamala at the helm, you’re not going to have to think about them every day. … It won’t be so exhausting. You’ll be able to get on with your lives,” Obama said, slamming Donald Trump.
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Laughing with Trump
Obama and Trump have a chat before the State Funeral Service for former President Jimmy Carter on January 9, 2025.Both men have had a long history of throwing jabs at one another. Recently, Trump claimed that Obama spied on him.
(Image: AFP via Getty Images)
