Barack Obama

Background

Born on Aug. 4, 1961 in Hawaii. He graduated from Columbia University in 1983 and Harvard Law School in 1991. Obama was the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review. He served as a community organizer in Chicago, leading voter registration drives, and taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago. He was elected to the Illinois State Senate in 1996 and was re-elected in 1998 and again in 2002. He was elected to the U.S. Senate in 2004 and served one term before running successfully for president of the United States in 2008. Married with two children.

Issues

He supported the 2008 bailout of financial institutions to manage the fiscal crisis and upon taking office intervened in the troubled housing market, buying up millions in devalued real estate. He supported a bailout of the automotive industry and signed a $787 million economic stimulus package in 2009. He passed legislation reforming the health care industry, fulfilling a campaign promise. He reversed a policy of President George W. Bush to limit funding for embryonic stem cell research. He repealed the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy preventing gay soldiers from serving openly. During the first two years of his presidency, he appointed two women, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, to serve on the Supreme Court. In 2009 he deployed additional troops into Afghanistan but in 2011 brought the war in Iraq to a close.