I then flew back to Washington, praying I’d been heard.
* * *
As fall continued, Barack and I began making plans for our move to a new house in January, having decided to stay in Washington so that Sasha could finish high school at Sidwell. Malia, meanwhile, was in South America on a gap-year adventure, feeling the freedom of being as far away from the political intensity as she could. I implored my staff in the East Wing to finish strong, even as they needed to think about finding new jobs, even as the battle between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump grew more intense and distracting by the day.
On November 7, 2016, the evening before the election, Barack and I made a quick trip to Philadelphia to join Hillary and her family at a final rally before an enormous crowd on Independence Mall. The mood was positive, expectant. I took heart in the optimism Hillary projected that night, and in the many polls that showed her with a comfortable lead. I took heart in what I thought I understood about the qualities Americans would and wouldn’t tolerate in a leader. I presumed nothing, but I felt good about the odds.
For the first time in many years, Barack and I had no role to play on election night. There was no hotel suite reserved for the wait; there were no trays of canapés laid out, no television blaring from any corner. There was no hair, makeup, or wardrobe to be tended to, no marshaling of our children, no late-night speech being prepped for delivery. We had nothing to do, and it thrilled us. This was the beginning of our stepping back, a first taste of what the future might be like. We were invested, of course, but the moment ahead wasn’t ours. It was merely ours to witness. Knowing it would be a while before results came in, we invited Valerie over to watch a movie in the White House theater.
I can’t remember a thing about the film that night—not its title, not even its genre. Really, we were just passing time in the dark. My mind kept turning over the reality that Barack’s term as president was almost finished. What lay ahead most immediately were good-byes—dozens and dozens of them, all emotional, as the staff we loved and appreciated so much would begin to rotate out of the White House. Our goal was to do what George and Laura Bush had done for us, making the transition of power as smooth as possible. Already, our teams were beginning to prepare briefing books and contact lists for their successors. Before they left, many East Wing staffers would leave handwritten notes on their desks, giving a friendly welcome and a standing offer of help to the next person coming along.
We were still immersed in the business of every day, but we’d also started to plan in earnest for what lay ahead. Barack and I were excited to stay in Washington but would build a legacy on the South Side of Chicago, which would become home to the Obama Presidential Center. We planned to launch a foundation as well, one whose mission would be to encourage and embolden a new generation of leaders. The two of us had many goals for the future, but the biggest involved creating more space and support for young people and their ideas. I also knew that we needed a break: I’d started scouting for a private place where we could go to decompress for a few days in January, immediately after the new president got sworn in.
We just needed the new president.
As the movie wrapped up and the lights came on, Barack’s cell phone buzzed. I saw him glance at it and then look again, his brow furrowing just slightly.
“Huh,” he said. “Results in Florida are looking kind of strange.”
There was no alarm in his voice, just a tiny seed of awareness, a hot ember glowing suddenly in the grass. The phone buzzed again. My heart started to tick faster. I knew the updates were coming from David Simas, Barack’s political adviser, who was monitoring returns from the West Wing and who understood the precise county-by-county algebra of the electoral map. If something cataclysmic was going to happen, Simas would spot it early.
I watched my husband’s face closely, not sure I was ready to hear what he was going to say. Whatever it was, it didn’t look good. I felt something leaden take hold in my stomach just then, my anxiety hardening into dread. As Barack and Valerie started to discuss the early results, I announced that I was going upstairs. I walked to the elevator, hoping to do only one thing, which was to block it all out and go to sleep. I understood what was probably happening, but I wasn’t ready to face it.
As I slept, the news was confirmed: American voters had elected Donald Trump to succeed Barack as the next president of the United States.
I wanted to not know that fact for as long as I possibly could.
The next day, I woke to a wet and dreary morning. A gray sky hung over Washington. I couldn’t help but interpret it as funereal. Time seemed to crawl. Sasha went off to school, quietly working through her disbelief. Malia called from Bolivia, sounding deeply rattled. I told both our girls that I loved them and that things would be okay. I kept trying to tell myself the same thing.
In the end, Hillary Clinton won nearly three million more votes than her opponent, but Trump had captured the Electoral College thanks to fewer than eighty thousand votes spread across Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan. I am not a political person, so I’m not going to attempt to offer an analysis of the results. I won’t try to speculate about who was responsible or what was unfair. I just wish more people had turned out to vote. And I will always wonder about what led so many women, in particular, to reject an exceptionally qualified female candidate and instead choose a misogynist as their president. But the result was now ours to live with.
Barack had stayed up most of the night tracking the data, and as had happened so many times before, he was called upon to step forward as a symbol of steadiness to help the nation process its shock. I didn’t envy him the task. He gave a morning pep talk to his staff in the Oval Office and then, around noon, delivered a set of sober but reassuring remarks to the nation from the Rose Garden, calling—as he always did—for unity and dignity, asking Americans to respect one another as well as the institutions built by our democracy.
That afternoon, I sat in my East Wing office with my entire staff, all of us crammed into the room on couches and desk chairs that had been pulled in from other rooms. My team was made up largely of women and minorities, including several who came from immigrant families. Many were in tears, feeling that their every vulnerability was now exposed. They’d poured themselves into their jobs because they believed thoroughly in the causes they were furthering. I tried to tell them at every turn that they should be proud of who they are, that their work mattered, and that one election couldn’t wipe away eight years of change.
Everything was not lost. This was the message we needed to carry forward. It’s what I truly believed. It wasn’t ideal, but it was our reality—the world as it is. We needed now to be resolute, to keep our feet pointed in the direction of progress.
* * *
We were at the end now, truly. I found myself caught between looking back and looking forward, mulling over one question in particular: What lasts?
We were the forty-fourth First Family and only the eleventh family to spend two full terms in the White House. We were, and would always be, the first black one. I hoped that when future parents brought their children to visit, the way I’d brought Malia and Sasha when their father was a senator, they’d be able to point out some reminder of our family’s time here. I thought it was important to register our presence within the larger history of the place.