Michelle Obama

Political Relative

Name at birth: Michelle LaVaughn Robinson

Michelle Obama, a lawyer, Chicago city administrator and community outreach worker, is the wife of U.S. Senator and presidential hopeful Barack Obama. Reared in a blue-collar home on Chicago's South Side, she was an associate at a law firm when she met Obama, a summer intern to whom she was assigned as adviser. She has worked in the offices of Chicago's mayor and planning commission, headed a career-training program for young adults and directed community affairs for the University of Chicago and its medical center. She caught the eye of a national audience at her husband's side when he delivered a high-profile speech at the Democratic National Convention in 2004. In 2007 she scaled back her own professional work to attend to family and campaign obligations during Barack's run for the presidential nomination.

Extra credit: She is a 1985 graduate of Princeton University. Her brother, Craig Robinson, Class of 1983, was a basketball star there and is now a college coach... She graduated from Harvard Law School (1988), but did not cross paths there with her future husband, who graduated 1991... The Obamas were married in 1992 and have two daughters, Malia (born 1998) and Natasha (2001), who is called Sasha.

For more election-year profiles, visit our Who2 Loop, Candidates 2008.

Blog posts mentioning Michelle Obama:
Wife Pounds Obama First Lady or 'First Laddy'?