I'm Dying At Barack Obama's Adorable Birthday Insta To Michelle
They may have left the White House three years ago, but Barack and Michelle Obama are still widely beloved. From sharing romantic social media posts to launching a production company, the former president and first lady seem to know exactly what their fans want. And on Friday, Jan. 17 — Michelle's birthday — they delivered yet again. Barack's 2020 birthday Instagram to Michelle was so adorably silly, and social media users couldn't get enough of it.
On Jan. 17, Michelle turned 56, and Barack clearly wanted all of his followers to know about the celebration. The former president posted four black and white photo booth-style photos to Instagram and Twitter, showing himself and Michelle kissing, cuddling, and generally mugging for the camera. "In every scene, you are my star, @MichelleObama!" he wrote in the photo caption. "Happy birthday, baby!"
In the 2019 iteration of Gallup's annual "most admired man/woman" poll, Americans overwhelmingly named Michelle Obama as their most admired woman, and Barack Obama is clearly No. 1 on the list of Michelle's admirers. The photos that Barack posted on Friday also got a lot of love from his fellow social media users, who described the couple as "relationship goals" and gushed over how cute they are. I mean... obviously.
It wasn't the first time that Barack posted an endearing tribute for his wife's birthday. In 2019, Barack posted a throwback picture of the couple with another cute caption: "I knew it way back then and I’m absolutely convinced of it today — you’re one of a kind, @MichelleObama. Happy Birthday!"
And in 2018, Barack posted a photo of himself looking fondly at Michelle. In his photo caption, he applauded his wife's "grace" and "determination."
The Obamas get a lot of attention for their sweet gestures over social media, but that's not all they do with all of their spare time now that they've put some distance between themselves and the White House. In 2018, for example, Barack and Michelle signed a deal with Netflix to launch Higher Ground Productions — and earlier this month, the production company's first documentary, American Factory, was nominated for an Oscar. Upon hearing that the documentary had received an Oscar nomination, Barack tweeted that the film was "exactly what Michelle and I hope to achieve with Higher Ground."
The former president and first lady have also had their own individual projects since the end of the Obama administration. Also in 2018, Michelle published her memoir, Becoming, which rapidly rose to the top of The New York Times Best Sellers List after being purchased more times than any other book in the country, per The Sacramento Bee. That same year, Michelle also launched a nonpartisan voter registration initiative called When We All Vote, which aimed to start conversations about voting and to get young people more engaged.
Barack, meanwhile, has had a lot on his plate, too. In 2019, he launched his own initiative to combat partisan gerrymandering, which he described as a "movement for fair maps." This initiative, called Redistricting U, aimed to prevent unfair redistricting by supplying local activists with the tools they need to weigh in on and impact redistricting. And most recently, the Chicago Sun-Times reported on Jan. 15 that the Obamas have pledged to donate at least $1 million to their Chicago-based Obama Foundation. From their political initiatives to their adorable social media posts, the Obamas have found a way to stay engaged with their supporters and fans, and they're likely to keep making headlines for years to come.
