Barack and Michelle Obama return to the White House for portrait…

Barack and Michelle Obama to return to the White House today: Ex-POTUS and First Lady to attend delayed unveiling of their portraits after Trump wouldn’t host ceremony

• The Obamas will return for the ceremony today, hosted by President Joe Biden
• It is customary for a former president to return for portrait unveiling during his successor’s tenure. However, Donald Trump did not host the usual ceremony
• Obama hosted former president George W. Bush and his wife, Laura in 2012 
• This means it is more than a decade since a president hosted the event
• Trump has never shown any interest in joining the bi-partisan ex-presidents club 
• The ceremony is scheduled for 1:30 p.m. ET in the White House East Room 

Barack Obama and his wife, former first lady Michelle Obama, return to the White House on Wednesday for the unveiling of their official portraits, hosted by fellow Democrat Joe Biden some five years after the former president left office.

Large, formal portraits of U.S. presidents and first ladies adorn walls, hallways and rooms throughout the White House, and customarily a former president returns for the unveiling during his successor’s tenure.

But the Obamas, who have remained popular since leaving the political limelight, did not have their ceremony while Republican President Donald Trump held power.

That means it’s been more than a decade since a first-term president has invited his predecessor for the event.

Trump, before winning election in 2016 and succeeding Obama in 2017, was a longtime proponent of the ‘birther’ movement that falsely suggested Obama was not born in the United States.

Barack Obama and his wife, former first lady Michelle Obama, return to the White House on Wednesday for the unveiling of their official portraits, hosted by fellow Democrat Joe Biden some five years after the former president left office. Pictured: 

Trump, before winning election in 2016 and succeeding Obama in 2017, was a longtime proponent of the ‘birther’ movement that falsely suggested Obama was not born in the United States. Pictured: Donald Trump (centre) is applauded by former President Barack Obama (left), former Vice President Joe Biden (top) and Sen. Chuck Schumer (right), D-NY, during Trump’s inauguration ceremonies at the US Capitol in Washington, DC, on January 20, 2017

A spokesperson for Obama declined to comment on the timing of the Obamas’ portrait unveilings.

White House Historical Association president Stewart McLaurin said there was no prescribed process for presidential portraits. 

‘It’s really up to the current president in the White House and the former president that is portrayed in the portrait to determine the right moment, but there is no set timeline,’ he said.

Obama hosted former president George W. Bush and his wife, Laura, for their portrait unveilings in 2012 during Obama’s first term.

Now Obama will be hosted by his former vice president, current President Joe Biden and his wife, Jill. The Obamas and Bidens became close during Obama’s presidency, going through the ups and downs of their political and personal lives, including the death of Biden’s son, Beau, from cancer.

‘Over the course of their eight years together in office, a close partnership between the two men grew through the highs and lows of the job and life,’ Biden’s press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, told reporters on Tuesday.

The current president and first lady were honored to host the unveiling of the portraits, ‘which will hang on the walls of the White House forever as reminders of the power of hope and change,’ she said.

The ceremony is scheduled for 1:30 p.m. ET in the White House East Room.

The portrait unveiling ceremony tradition goes back decades. 

It originated as a first ladies event – with first lady Lady Bird Johnson inviting Eleanor Roosevelt and Bess Truman to the White House, along with family and friends, for East Room ceremonies. 

The last portrait ceremony to happen at the White House was in May 2012 when President Barack Obama (left) and first lady Michelle Obama (right) invited President George W. Bush (center left) and Laura Bush (center right) to the White House 

President Joe Biden (left) is holding the portrait unveiling ceremony more than two years after former President Donald Trump (right) should have invited the Obamas to the White House, which he declined to do 

The Roosevelt ceremony took place in February 1966. 

Former first lady Jackie Kennedy made her only return trip to the White House after President John F. Kennedy’s assassination in 1971 to see her late husband’s portrait hung. President Richard Nixon and first lady Pat Nixon invited her for a ceremony – and she agreed to come for a private viewing.

In 1978, President Jimmy Carter was the first president to play host, bringing President Gerald Ford and former first lady Betty Ford to the White House for an East Room ceremony.  

He had defeated Ford in the 1976 presidential race. 

There was no ceremony for Carter during President Ronald Reagan’s tenure – however Carter’s White House communications director Gerald Rafshoon told NBC that was likely Carter’s choice, not a snub.  

‘It would probably be out of his character to want a big ceremony in Washington that soon,’ Rafshoon told the network. ‘I would imagine he opted not to have it.’ 

President George H.W. Bush, who served as Reagan’s vice president, brought the Reagans back to the White House in November 1989. 

First ladies Barbara Bush (left) and Nancy Reagan (center left) have a giggle as they observe President Ronald Reagan’s (center right) portrait being unveiled during the tenure of President George H.W. Bush (right)  

President Bill Clinton (left) and Hillary Clinton (center left) brought in first lady Barbara Bush (center right) and President George H.W. Bush (right) to the Whtie House for a portrait unveiling ceremony in July 1995 

President George W. Bush (right) and first lady Laura Bush (center right) invited President Bill Clinton (left) and Hillary Clinton (cente left) to the White House for a portrait unveiling in June 2004 

President Bill Clinton, who defeated Bush in the 1992 election, held a ceremony for his predecessor in July 1995 that both Bush and first lady Barbara Bush attended. 

With the White House swinging back to Republican rule after the 2000 election, President George W. Bush had the Clintons come visit in June 2004. 

The final modern ceremony took place in 2012, with the Obamas invitation to George W. and Laura Bush for the unveiling.

‘We may have our differences politically, but the presidency transcends those differences,’ Obama said at the time.

The previous portraits differ from the modernist pieces of the Obamas that were unveiled at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery in 2019. 

Trump has never shown any interest in joining the bi-partisan ex-presidents club – with the living officer holders: Carter, Clinton, Bush 43 and Obama seemingly on good terms. 

Trump refused to attend Biden’s 2021 inauguration, alongside Obama, Clinton and George W. Bush. 

Trump has never shown any interest in joining the bi-partisan ex-presidents club – with the living officer holders: Carter, Clinton, Bush 43 and Obama seemingly on good terms

Trump refused to attend Biden’s 2021 inauguration, alongside Obama, Clinton and George W. Bush. Obama attended Trump’s inauguration in 2017 (pictured)

Carter, who was 96 at the time, didn’t attend due to health concerns amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Biden later visited Carter and his wife Rosalynn at their home in Plains, Georgia in April 2021. 

Trump also nixed an idea to receive his COVID-19 vaccine alongside the ex-presidents. 

In a new book, aide Brian Morgenstern, the White House deputy press secretary and deputy communications director at the time, recalled someone floating the idea of having the ‘president invite the former presidents to the White House – or to some other site – to have all of them receive the vaccine together in a show of unity.’ 

Morgenstern said he and another staffer were tasked with posing the idea to Trump in his private study.  

‘He made a face that conveyed, shall we say, a healthy scepticism,’ writes Morgenstern.

‘He said, “I’ll get the shot. Do they want me to get the shot? I’ll get the shot.” ‘But regarding an event with the former presidents, he said: “Nah, I’m a different kind of a guy, ya know?”‘ 

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