The Obama Speak Out in First Interview Since Leaving Office

Barack and Michelle Obama are stepping back into the national spotlight together as they prepare to open a presidential center that is as much about the future of American democracy as it is about their historic years in the White House.

In their first joint network television interview since leaving Washington in 2017, the former president and first lady sat down with ABC News’ Robin Roberts at the new Obama Presidential Center in Chicago, reflecting on their journey from the South Side to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and the legacy they hope will outlast the bitter politics of the moment.

The center, set to open Friday, represents the culmination of the Obamas’ long public story: a young organizer who rose through Chicago politics, became the nation’s first Black president, and entered the White House with Michelle Obama and their daughters at a moment millions of Americans saw as a turning point in history.

But Barack Obama also acknowledged that many Americans are feeling worn down by the state of the country.

“People are a little discouraged right now,” he told Roberts in the interview, which aired Wednesday on Good Morning America. “But, again, I believe that we go through these cycles, and there’s going to be a younger generation that pops up and there are going to be leaders who pop up.”

The former president said he has tried not to dominate the political conversation since leaving office, describing himself now as more of a “coach” than a “player.” While some Democrats have wanted him to be more visible in an era of fierce polarization, Obama said he has chosen his moments carefully.

“You pick and choose your spots. I’m not suggesting I’ve done it perfectly,” he said.

Obama pointed to George Washington as an example of a leader who knew when to step aside after serving the country.

“He kind of said, ‘All right, I’ve done my stint. And now I’m going, you know, back home,’” Obama said. “I think Michelle, you know, very much would prefer a quieter life for us. And on the other hand, there’ve been some folks who would like to see me out every day, right, banging the drum.”

That quieter life, however, is now intersecting with one of the most ambitious post-presidential projects in modern history.

The Obama Presidential Center sits on 19 acres in Chicago’s Jackson Park, near the University of Chicago and not far from the neighborhoods that shaped Obama’s early career. The $850 million campus includes parkland, the Obama Foundation’s offices, an auditorium for public events, public art, athletic facilities and a new branch of the Chicago Public Library.

Unlike traditional presidential libraries, the Obama archives are fully digital through a collaboration with the National Archives and Records Administration.

The centerpiece is a four-story museum designed to place the Obama presidency within the broader sweep of American history. Its exhibits trace the country’s democratic promise from the Declaration of Independence through the civil rights movement, labor struggles and the grassroots Chicago organizing that helped launch Obama’s political rise.

For Obama, the center is not just a monument to the past. It is meant to serve as a training ground for the leaders who come next.

Part of the mission, he said, is to “encourage the next generation of leadership.”

When Roberts asked Obama to name the greatest accomplishment of his presidency, he pointed to the Affordable Care Act, the landmark health care law passed in 2010. The law expanded Medicaid, strengthened protections for consumers and helped lower health care costs for millions of Americans, especially lower-income families.

Obama said the law remains proof that his administration tried to govern for the entire country, even in the face of relentless Republican resistance.

“For all the resistance from our political opposition, the Affordable Care Act has now helped 50, 60 million people, and continues to help people even though the current Congress has tried to weaken it and taken away some of the subsidies that were really helping a lot of working people,” Obama said. “I’m very proud of the message we sent to the country that we’re representing everybody.”

The museum also revisits the themes that powered Obama’s rise: hope, change and the belief that ordinary people could still bend the country toward something better.

Those ideas may feel distant in today’s angry political climate, but Michelle Obama said they are not gone.

“People just have to be fed up enough. They have to want more,” she said. “And I think the presidential center hopefully will remind people of just how close we are to moving this country in the direction that we want to move it in.”

Michelle Obama also reflected on what it meant for their family to become the first Black first family in American history, a milestone that once seemed impossible to many.

“You have one exhibit where people thought that it could never happen, that a Black man, a Black family would never live in the White House. That America would never accept that,” she said. “And lo and behold, the whole country, you know, the vast majority of the country believe differently.”

At a time when democracy itself has become a central political fight, Barack Obama said the museum’s message is rooted in one of the country’s most basic promises: the right to disagree, challenge leaders and settle those disagreements at the ballot box.

“The premise of this country is everybody gets a right to say, ‘No, I don’t agree with that. I challenge that. No, Obama, I think you’re making a mistake,’” he said. “And then we have a conversation about it, and then it gets settled in an election. And if enough people decide I didn’t know what I was doing, then you move on to the next person.”

The Obamas’ return to the spotlight comes at a moment when many Americans are exhausted by division, distrust and political chaos. But their new center is being framed as a reminder of a different vision of public life: one built on civic engagement, generational change and the still-radical idea that democracy only works when people believe they have a stake in it.

ABC News’ special, The Obama Legacy: First Joint Interview Post-White House, streams Thursday, June 18, on Disney+ and Hulu.