Former First Lady Michelle Obama has opened up about the first spark that caught her attention when she met her future husband, Barack Obama — and it wasn’t his looks.
On Wednesday’s episode of IMO with Michelle Obama and Craig Robinson, which she co-hosts with her brother, Michelle recalled meeting the future 44th president in 1988 while working at Chicago law firm Sidley & Austin. Barack, then 27, was a summer associate fresh from his first year at Harvard Law School, and Michelle, a recent Harvard Law graduate, was assigned to be his adviser.
“I knew of him — everybody was abuzz about this hotshot Harvard law student,” she said. But at first, she admitted, she was skeptical. “I got his profile and thought, ‘Ugh. What kind of name is Barack Obama?’ He grew up in Hawaii, and I thought, ‘How many Black people grow up in Hawaii?’ I had this whole image in my head.”
That changed when they spoke by phone for the first time. “The voice was sexier than the image I had about him,” she said, adding that Barack’s self-assuredness impressed her. Meeting him in person sealed it: “He was cute. His picture didn’t do him justice. He was cool in a way I didn’t expect.”
Barack has previously shared his own first impressions, telling Oprah.com: “I remember being struck by how tall and beautiful she was.” He joked that she was “pleasantly surprised” his nose and ears weren’t as large as in his firm photo.
Michelle initially turned down his repeated date requests due to their professional relationship. She finally agreed after he teased that he’d quit if she kept saying no. Their first date included Baskin-Robbins ice cream, eaten on the curb, ending with a chocolate-flavored kiss.
Now married for nearly 33 years, the couple often shares affectionate public notes. Barack marked this year’s Valentine’s Day with, “Thirty-two years together and you still take my breath away,” while on Mother’s Day he wrote that he and their daughters were “so lucky” to have her.
Even on the podcast, the couple exchanged playful banter. “She took me back!” Barack joked in response to divorce rumors, to which Michelle replied, “Now don’t start.”
