Barack Obama

"Hillary has got her share of critics. She has been caricatured by the right and by some on the left. She has been accused of everything you can imagine — and some things that you cannot. But she knows that’s what happens when you’re under a microscope for 40 years. She knows that sometimes during those 40 years she’s made mistakes — just like I have; just like we all do. That’s what happens when we try. That’s what happens when you’re the kind of citizen Teddy Roosevelt once described — not the timid souls who criticize from the sidelines, but someone “who is actually in the arena…who strives valiantly; who errs…but who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement.” Hillary Clinton is that woman in the arena. She’s been there for us — even if we haven’t always noticed. And if you’re serious about our democracy, you can’t afford to stay home just because she might not align with you on every issue. You’ve got to get in the arena with her, because democracy isn’t a spectator sport. America isn’t about “yes, he will.” It’s about “yes, we can.” And we’re going to carry Hillary to victory this fall, because that’s what the moment demands. [Audience: Yes, we can! Yes, we can! Yes, we can!] Yes, we can. Not "yes, she can." Not "yes, I can." "Yes, we can.""

"You know, there’s been a lot of talk in this campaign about what America has lost — people who tell us that our way of life is being undermined by pernicious changes and dark forces beyond our control. They tell voters there’s a “real America” out there that must be restored. This isn’t an idea, by the way, that started with Donald Trump. It’s been peddled by politicians for a long time — probably from the start of our Republic. And it’s got me thinking about the story I told you 12 years ago tonight, about my Kansas grandparents and the things they taught me when I was growing up. See, my grandparents, they came from the heartland. Their ancestors began settling there about 200 years ago. I don’t know if they have their birth certificates — but they were there. They were Scotch-Irish mostly — farmers, teachers, ranch hands, pharmacists, oil rig workers. Hardy, small town folks. Some were Democrats, but a lot of them — maybe even most of them — were Republicans. Party of Lincoln. And my grandparents explained that folks in these parts, they didn’t like show-offs. They didn’t admire braggarts or bullies. They didn’t respect mean-spiritedness, or folks who were always looking for shortcuts in life. Instead, what they valued were traits like honesty and hard work, kindness, courtesy, humility, responsibility, helping each other out. That’s what they believed in. True things. Things that last. The things we try to teach our kids."

"To all of you who served in Afghanistan, you can take enormous pride in the progress you helped achieve: Driving al Qaeda out of its camps. Toppling the Taliban. Delivering justice to Osama bin Laden. Helping Afghans improve their lives. There are millions of boys and girls in school, and democratic elections and a democratic government. Training Afghan forces to take responsibility for their own security so that we are no longer engaged in a major ground war in Afghanistan. That is your legacy. And today we salute our forces serving there on a more limited mission -- supporting Afghan forces, going after terrorists -- because we must never allow Afghanistan to be used as a safe haven for terrorists to attack our nation again."

"To all of you who served in Iraq, we saw your heroism in pushing out a dictator whose brutality must be condemned, never praised. In defeating an insurgency. In giving the Iraqi people a chance. And no matter what has happened since, your valor in the deserts, in fierce urban combat, will be honored in the annals of military history."

"America’s Army is the best-trained, best-equipped land force on the planet. Our Navy is the largest and most lethal in the world. The precision of, and reach of, our Air Force is unmatched. Our Marines are the world’s only truly expeditionary force. We have the world’s finest Coast Guard. We have the most capable fighting force in history -- and we’re going to keep it that way."

"No ally or adversary should ever doubt our strength and our resolve."

"From the Asia Pacific to Africa to the Americas, the United States and our armed forces will remain the greatest force for freedom and security and peace that the world has ever known. That is your legacy. That is what we have to protect, and that is what we have to defend."

"No one -- no one -- has given more for our freedom and our security than our Gold Star families. ... They represent the very best of our country. They continue to inspire us every day, every moment. They serve as a powerful reminder of the true strength of America. We have to do everything we can for those families, and honor them, and be humbled by them."

"Our commitment to our veterans is a sacred covenant. ... It is sacred because there's no more solemn request than to ask someone to risk their life, to be ready to give their life on our behalf. It's a covenant because both sides have responsibilities. Those who put on the uniform, you took an oath to protect and defend us. While the rest of us, the citizens you kept safe, we pledged to take care of you and your families when you come home. That's a sacred covenant. That's a solemn promise that we make to each other. And it is binding. And upholding it is a moral imperative. ... If there’s ever a breach in the covenant, then leaders in this country have to work hard to regain trust. ... And when we take care of each other and uphold that sacred covenant, there is nothing we cannot do."

"We need to keep improving mental health care. I’ll never forget the soldiers I met at Fort Bliss. They were proud of their service, but they were struggling with issues like post-traumatic stress. So, for veterans with PTS, we made it easier for you to qualify for the VA care that you need -- no matter when you served. We’ve increased funding for veterans mental health care by more than 75 percent -- billions more dollars. More awareness and outreach -- because we have to end any shame or stigma that comes with going and getting help."

"A world in which one percent of humanity controls as much wealth as the other 99 percent will never be stable. I understand that the gaps between rich and poor are not new, but just as the child in a slum today can see the skyscraper nearby, technology now allows any person with a smartphone to see how the most privileged among us live and the contrast between their own lives and others. Expectations rise, then, faster than governments can deliver, and a pervasive sense of injustice undermine people’s faith in the system. [...] economies are more successful when we close the gap between rich and poor, and growth is broadly based. And that means respecting the rights of workers so they can organize into independent unions and earn a living wage. It means investing in our people -- their skills, their education, their capacity to take an idea and turn it into a business. It means strengthening the safety net that protects our people from hardship and allows them to take more risks -- to look for a new job, or start a new venture."

"That’s why we’ve worked with other nations to create higher and clearer standards for banking and taxation -- because a society that asks less of oligarchs than ordinary citizens will rot from within. That’s why we’ve pushed for transparency and cooperation in rooting out corruption, and tracking illicit dollars, because markets create more jobs when they're fueled by hard work, and not the capacity to extort a bribe."

"So those of us who believe in democracy, we need to speak out forcefully, because both the facts and history, I believe, are on our side. That doesn’t mean democracies are without flaws. It does mean that the cure for what ails our democracies is greater engagement by our citizens -- not less."

"Now, there’s no easy answer for resolving all these social forces, and we must respect the meaning that people draw from their own traditions -- from their religion, from their ethnicity, from their sense of nationhood. But I do not believe progress is possible if our desire to preserve our identities gives way to an impulse to dehumanize or dominate another group. If our religion leads us to persecute those of another faith, if we jail or beat people who are gay, if our traditions lead us to prevent girls from going to school, if we discriminate on the basis of race or tribe or ethnicity, then the fragile bonds of civilization will fray. The world is too small, we are too packed together, for us to be able to resort to those old ways of thinking."

"But we have to follow through, even when the politics are hard. Because in the eyes of innocent men and women and children who, through no fault of their own, have had to flee everything that they know, everything that they love, we have to have the empathy to see ourselves. We have to imagine what it would be like for our family, for our children, if the unspeakable happened to us. And we should all understand that, ultimately, our world will be more secure if we are prepared to help those in need and the nations who are carrying the largest burden with respect to accommodating these refugees."

"And in my own life, in this country, and as President, I have learned that our identities do not have to be defined by putting someone else down, but can be enhanced by lifting somebody else up. They don’t have to be defined in opposition to others, but rather by a belief in liberty and equality and justice and fairness. [...] But my faith in those principles does force me to expand my moral imagination and to recognize that I can best serve my own people, I can best look after my own daughters, by making sure that my actions seek what is right for all people and all children, and your daughters and your sons."

"And as I said last night, my number one priority in the coming two months is to try to facilitate a transition that ensures our president-elect is successful."

"And I had been very encouraged by the, I think, interest in President-elect Trump’s wanting to work with my team around many of the issues that this great country faces. And I believe that it is important for all of us, regardless of party and regardless of political preferences, to now come together, work together to deal with the many challenges that we face."

"I’m still asking you to believe – not in my ability to bring about change, but in yours. I believe in change because I believe in you."

"As I’ve said many times before, true democracy is a project that’s much bigger than any one of us. It’s bigger than any one person, any one president, any one government. It’s a job for all of us. It requires everyday sustained effort from all of us — the work of perfecting our union is never finished. We look forward to joining you in that effort as fellow citizens."

"If I become so convinced that ‘I’m always right,’ the logical conclusion of that often ends up being great cruelty and great violence."

"We can find people on the internet who agree with our ideas, no matter how crazy. Democracies do not work if we are not operating on some level based on reason and fact and logic - and not just passion. We're going to have to find ways to push back on propaganda and listen to those we don't agree with."

"[W]hat I want to focus on tonight [is the] state of our democracy. Understand, democracy does not require uniformity. Our founders argued. They quarreled. Eventually they compromised. They expected us to do the same. But they knew that democracy does require a basic sense of solidarity - the idea that for all our outward differences, we're all in this together; that we rise or fall as one."

"[I]f anyone can put together a plan that is demonstrably better than the improvements we've made to our health care system and that covers as many people at less cost, I will publicly support it."

"If every economic issue is framed as a struggle between a hardworking white middle class and an undeserving minority, then workers of all shades are going to be left fighting for scraps while the wealthy withdraw further into their private enclaves."

"Politics is a battle of ideas. That's how our democracy was designed. In the course of a healthy debate, we prioritize different goals, and the different means of reaching them. But without some common baseline of facts, without a willingness to admit new information, and concede that your opponent might be making a fair point, and that science and reason matter - then we're going to keep talking past each other, and we'll make common ground and compromise impossible."

"If the scope of freedom and respect for the rule of law shrinks around the world, the likelihood of war within and between nations increases, and our own freedoms will eventually be threatened."

"It falls to each of us to be those anxious, jealous guardians of our democracy; to embrace the joyous task we've been given to continually try to improve this great nation of ours. Because for all our outward differences, we, in fact, all share the same proud title, the most important office in a democracy: Citizen. Citizen."

"We have traveled the world together. We did a few singles, a few doubles together. I’ve offered advice that I thought was pretty sound, like don’t do stupid stuff.(LAUGHTER) And even when you complained about my long answers, I just want you to know that the only reason they were long was because you asked six-part questions.(LAUGHTER)But I have enjoyed working with all of you. That does not, of course, mean that I’ve enjoyed every story that you have filed, but that’s the point of this relationship. You’re not supposed to be (inaudible) fans, you’re supposed to be skeptics, you’re supposed to ask me tough questions. You’re not supposed to be complimentary, but you’re supposed to cast a critical eye on folks who hold enormous power and make sure that we are accountable to the people who sent us here, and you have done that. And you have done it for the most part in ways that I could appreciate for fairness, even if I didn’t always agree with your conclusions. And having you in this building has made this place work better. It keeps us honest, it makes us work harder. You have made us think about how we are doing what we do and whether or not we’re able to deliver on what’s been requested by our constituents."

"I spent a lot of time on my — in my farewell address talking about the state of our democracy. It goes without saying that essential to that is a free press. That is part of how this place, this country, this grand experiment of self-government has to work. It doesn’t work if we don’t have a well-informed citizenry, and you are the conduit through which they receive the information about what’s taking place in the halls of power. So America needs you and our democracy needs you. We need you to establish a baseline of facts and evidence that we can use as a starting point for the kind of reasoned and informed debates that ultimately lead to progress. And so my hope is is that you will continue with the same tenacity that you showed us, to do the hard work of getting to the bottom of stories and getting them right and to push those of us in power to be the best version of ourselves and to push this country to be the best version of itself."

"But you know, we — when we feel stress, when we feel pressure, when we’re just fed information that encourages some of our worst instincts, we tend to fall back into some of the old racial fears and racial divisions and racial stereotypes, and it’s very hard for us to break out of those and to listen and to think about people as people and to imagine being in that person’s shoes. And by the way, it’s no longer a black and white issue alone. You got Hispanic folks and you got Asian folks, this is not just the same old battles that — we’ve got this stew that’s bubbling up from people everywhere and we’re going to have to make sure that we in our own lives and our own families and work places do a better job of treating everybody with basic respect and understanding that not everybody starts off in the same situation and imaging what would it be like if you were born in an inner city and had no job prospects anywhere within a 20 mile radius or how does it feel being born in some rural county where there’s no job opportunities within in a 20 mile radius and seeing those two things as connected as opposed to separate. So, you know, we got work to do, but overall, I think on this front, the trend lines, ultimately, I think will be good."

"I think it was really interesting to see how Malia and Sasha reacted. They were disappointed. They paid attention to what their mom said during the campaign and believed it because it’s consistent with what we have tried to teach them in our household and what I’ve tried to model as a father with their mom and what we’ve asked them to expect from future boyfriends or spouses. But what we’ve also tried to teach them is resilience and we’ve tried to teach them hope and that the only thing that is the end of the world is the end of the world. And so, you get knocked down, you get up, brush yourself off and you get back to work."

"You know, I have said before, and I will say again, that when we started on this journey, we did so with an abiding faith in the American people and their ability, our ability, to join together and change the country in ways that would make life better for our kids and our grandkids."

"That change didn't happen from the top down, but it happened from the bottom up. It was met sometimes with skepticism and doubt. Some folks didn't think we could pull it off. There were those that felt that the institutions of power and privilege in this country were too deeply entrenched. And yet, all of you came together in small towns and big cities, a whole bunch of you really young, and you decided to believe and you knocked on doors and you made phone calls and you talked to your parents who didn't know how to pronounce Barack Obama. And you got to know each other. And you went into communities that maybe you had never even thought about visiting and met people that on the surface seemed completely different than you -- didn't look like you or talk like you or watch the same TV programs as you. And yet, once you started talking to them, it turned out that you had something in common. And it grew and it built. And people took notice. And throughout, it was infused with a sense of hope. As I said in 2004, it wasn't blind optimism that drove you to do all of this work. It wasn't naiveté. It wasn't willful ignorance to all the challenges that America faces. It was hope in the face of difficulty. Hope in the face of uncertainty. You proved the power of hope."

"When words stop meaning anything, when truth doesn’t matter, when people can just lie with abandon, democracy can’t work."

"It was in service of this long walk towards freedom and justice and equal opportunity that Nelson Mandela devoted his life. At the outset, his struggle was particular to this place, to his homeland – a fight to end apartheid, a fight to ensure lasting political and social and economic equality for its disenfranchised non-white citizens. But through his sacrifice and unwavering leadership and, perhaps most of all, through his moral example, Mandela and the movement he led would come to signify something larger. He came to embody the universal aspirations of dispossessed people all around the world, their hopes for a better life, the possibility of a moral transformation in the conduct of human affairs. Madiba’s light shone so brightly, even from that narrow Robben Island cell, that in the late ‘70s he could inspire a young college student on the other side of the world to reexamine his own priorities, could make me consider the small role I might play in bending the arc of the world towards justice. And when later, as a law student, I witnessed Madiba emerge from prison, just a few months, you’ll recall, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, I felt the same wave of hope that washed through hearts all around the world. Do you remember that feeling? It seemed as if the forces of progress were on the march, that they were inexorable. Each step he took, you felt this is the moment when the old structures of violence and repression and ancient hatreds that had so long stunted people’s lives and confined the human spirit – that all that was crumbling before our eyes. And then, as Madiba guided this nation through negotiation painstakingly, reconciliation, its first fair and free elections; as we all witnessed the grace and the generosity with which he embraced former enemies, the wisdom for him to step away from power once he felt his job was complete, we understood that – we understood it was not just the subjugated, the oppressed who were being freed from the shackles of the past. The subjugator was being offered a gift, being given a chance to see in a new way, being given a chance to participate in the work of building a better world."

"So, on Madiba’s 100th birthday, we now stand at a crossroads – a moment in time at which two very different visions of humanity’s future compete for the hearts and the minds of citizens around the world. Two different stories, two different narratives about who we are and who we should be. How should we respond? Should we see that wave of hope that we felt with Madiba’s release from prison, from the Berlin Wall coming down – should we see that hope that we had as naïve and misguided? Should we understand the last 25 years of global integration as nothing more than a detour from the previous inevitable cycle of history — where might makes right, and politics is a hostile competition between tribes and races and religions, and nations compete in a zero-sum game, constantly teetering on the edge of conflict until full-blown war breaks out? Is that what we think? Let me tell you what I believe. I believe in Nelson Mandela’s vision. I believe in a vision shared by Gandhi and King and Abraham Lincoln. I believe in a vision of equality and justice and freedom and multi-racial democracy, built on the premise that all people are created equal, and they’re endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights. And I believe that a world governed by such principles is possible and that it can achieve more peace and more cooperation in pursuit of a common good. That’s what I believe. And I believe we have no choice but to move forward; that those of us who believe in democracy and civil rights and a common humanity have a better story to tell. And I believe this not just based on sentiment, I believe it based on hard evidence."

"The fact that the world’s most prosperous and successful societies, the ones with the highest living standards and the highest levels of satisfaction among their people, happen to be those which have most closely approximated the liberal, progressive ideal that we talk about and have nurtured the talents and contributions of all their citizens. The fact that authoritarian governments have been shown time and time again to breed corruption, because they’re not accountable; to repress their people; to lose touch eventually with reality; to engage in bigger and bigger lies that ultimately result in economic and political and cultural and scientific stagnation. Look at history. Look at the facts. The fact that countries which rely on rabid nationalism and xenophobia and doctrines of tribal, racial, or religious superiority as their main organizing principle, the thing that holds people together – eventually those countries find themselves consumed by civil war or external war. Check the history books. The fact that technology cannot be put back in a bottle, so we’re stuck with the fact that we now live close together and populations are going to be moving, and environmental challenges are not going to go away on their own, so that the only way to effectively address problems like climate change or mass migration or pandemic disease will be to develop systems for more international cooperation, not less."

"Appealing to tribe, appealing to fear, pitting one group against another, telling people that order and security will be restored if it weren’t for those who don’t look like us or don’t sound like us or don’t pray like we do, that’s an old playbook. It’s as old as time. And in a healthy democracy it doesn’t work. Our antibodies kick in, and people of goodwill from across the political spectrum callout the bigots and the fearmongers, and work to compromise and get things done and promote the better angels of our nature."

"But when there’s a vacuum in our democracy, when we don’t vote, when we take our basic rights and freedoms for granted, when we turn away and stop paying attention and stop engaging and stop believing and look for the newest diversion, the electronic versions of bread and circuses, then other voices fill the void. A politics of fear and resentment and retrenchment takes hold. And demagogues promise simple fixes to complex problems. They promise to fight for the little guy even as they cater to the wealthiest and the most powerful. They promise to clean up corruption and then plunder away. They start undermining norms that ensure accountability, try to change the rules to entrench their power further. And they appeal to racial nationalism that’s barely veiled, if veiled at all."

"And we won’t win people over by calling them names, or dismissing entire chunks of the country as racist, or sexist, or homophobic. When I say bring people together, I mean all of our people. You know, this whole notion that has sprung up recently about Democrats need to choose between trying to appeal to the white working class voters, or voters of color, and women and LGBT Americans, that’s nonsense. I don’t buy that. I got votes from every demographic. We won by reaching out to everybody and competing everywhere and by fighting for every vote. And that’s what we’ve got to do in this election and every election after that."

"One election will not fix everything that needs to be fixed, but it will be a start. And you have to start it. What’s going to fix our democracy is you. People ask me, what are you going to do for the election? No, the question is: what are you going to do? You’re the antidote. Your participation and your spirit and your determination, not just in this election but in every subsequent election, and in the days between elections."

"Some of you may be aware our gun laws in the United States don’t make much sense. Anybody can buy any weapon any time — without much if any regulation, they can buy it over the Internet, they can buy machine gun."

"Democracy is a garden that has to be tended."

"Considering his enormous impact on the history of this country, what always struck those who met John was his gentleness and humility. Born into modest means in the heart of the Jim Crow South, he understood that he was just one of a long line of heroes in the struggle for racial justice. Early on, he embraced the principles of nonviolent resistance and civil disobedience as the means to bring about real change in this country, understanding that such tactics had the power not only to change laws, but to change hearts and minds as well."

"We won’t have a president that threatens people with jail for just criticizing him"

"Short, owlish, with a smooth Kentucky accent, McConnell seemed an unlikely Republican leader. He showed no aptitude for schmoozing, backslapping, or rousing oratory. As far as anyone could tell, he had no close friends even in his own caucus, nor did he appear to have any strong convictions beyond an almost religious opposition to any version of campaign finance reform. Joe told me of one run-in he'd had on the Senate floor after the Republican leader blocked a bill Joe was sponsoring; when Joe tried to explain the bill's merits, McConnell raised his hand like a traffic cop and said, "You must be under the mistaken impression that I care." But what McConnell lacked in charisma or interest in policy he more than made up for in discipline, shrewdness, and shamelessness- all of which he employed in the single-minded and dispassionate pursuit of power."

"As we grieve the children of Uvalde today, we should take time to recognize that two years have passed since the murder of George Floyd under the knee of a police officer. His killing stays with us all to this day, especially those who loved him."

"I will admit it is impossible to be dispassionate in the face of this carnage. It is hard to feel hopeful. The images of families mourning, of bodies being pulled from rubble force a moral reckoning on all of us. The ensuing debate has roiled college campuses, divided friends and allies, laid bare generational divides, and set off a surge of antisemitism and anti-Muslim sentiment. Even here, within our Obama Foundation family, we’ve had to sort through our anguish, our outrage, our fears, and our differences on the issues. Not so much differences in the outcome we wish for. I had a conversation with a group of you around this issue, and you were passionate and pushed me around some of the public statements I had made. The issue is not a wish for different outcomes, an end to the killing, peaceful coexistence between two sovereign and free peoples, but rather different assessments of the path that we need to take in order to get there, and the roles each of us have to play in order to maximize the chances of what seems impossible right now. And yet, as heartbreaking as the news is right now — and it is heartbreaking — as daunting as all the challenges that we face may be, I stand here convinced that it is within our power, or more specifically within your power to make this world better. That’s what this Democracy Forum is all about. It’s an affirmation of our shared, unyielding belief that war and racial division and religious conflict and poverty and hunger and catastrophic climate change are not inevitable."

"What makes me cautiously optimistic about my successor and the shift from campaign mode to governance is there’s something about the solemn responsibilities of that office, the extraordinary demands that are placed on the United States -- not just by its own people but by people around the world -- that forces you to focus, that demands seriousness. And if you’re not serious about the job, then you probably won’t be there very long because it will expose problems. Even when you’re doing a job, even when you are attentive, there are so many things that come across your desk that people are going to question you, and you’re going to have opponents and you’re going to have critics, and you figure that out pretty fast when you’re sitting there. And I think the President-elect is going to see fairly quickly that the demands and responsibilities of a U.S. President are not ones that you can treat casually, and that in a big, complex, diverse country, the only way that you can be successful is by listening and reaching out and working with a wide variety of people."