By Marian Robinson, the mother of former First Lady Michelle Obama, has passed away at the age of 86, according to a family statement shared with NBC News.
“She passed peacefully this morning, and right now, none of us are quite sure how exactly we’ll move on without her,” the statement said. The family statement comes from Michelle and Barack Obama; Craig Robinson and his wife, Kelly; and Marian Robinson’s grandchildren, Avery, Leslie, Malia, Sasha, Austin, and Aaron.
Robinson became known as the nation’s first grandmother after her son-in-law, Barack Obama, won the 2008 presidential election. She was a consistent presence in the White House during his eight-year tenure, maintaining a low profile while attending holiday events, overseas trips, and concerts in the East Room. Most importantly, she spent a significant amount of time with her granddaughters, Sasha and Malia.
Having lived in Chicago her entire life, Robinson agreed to move to Washington, D.C., in 2009 to reside in the White House and help care for her granddaughters, who were seven and ten years old at the time. In a CBS interview, she later explained, “I felt like this was going to be a very hard life for both of them. And I was worried about their safety, and I was worried about my grandkids. That’s what got me to move to D.C.”
In their statement, Robinson’s family noted she agreed to leave Chicago with “a healthy nudge.” They said, “We needed her. The girls needed her. And she ended up being our rock through it all.” The statement highlighted her joy in being a grandmother, adding, “Although she enforced whatever household rules we’d set for bedtime, watching TV, or eating candy, she made clear that she sided with her ‘grandbabies’ in thinking that their parents were too darn strict.”
Robinson was born in Chicago in 1937 and grew up on the city’s South Side, where she raised her daughter and son, Craig Robinson. She was married to Fraser Robinson, who passed away in 1991 from multiple sclerosis.
Former President Barack Obama once described his mother-in-law as “the least pretentious person I know.” Indeed, Robinson admitted in the CBS interview that it was a “huge adjustment” being waited on by White House residence staff, whom she eventually convinced to let her do her own laundry. The family statement shared fond memories of her simple pleasures, saying, “Rather than hobnobbing with Oscar winners or Nobel laureates, she preferred spending her time upstairs with a TV tray, in the room outside her bedroom with big windows that looked out at the Washington Monument. The only guest she made a point of asking to meet was the Pope.”
Barack Obama credited Robinson with keeping his daughters grounded during their time in the White House. “She’s down to Earth and she doesn’t understand all the fuss,” he said in an interview on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.”
Michelle Obama was deeply close to her mother. Robinson narrated the biographical video introducing her daughter at the 2008 Democratic National Convention. After leaving the White House, Robinson humorously remarked, “My saying is when I grow up, I would like to be like Michelle Obama.”
Recently, Michelle Obama honored her mother on Mother’s Day by announcing that an exhibit at the Obama Presidential Center Museum in Chicago would be named after her. “In so many ways, she fostered in me a deep sense of confidence in who I was and who I could be by teaching me how to think for myself, how to use my own voice, and how to understand my own worth,” Michelle Obama said in a video announcement. “I simply wouldn’t be who I am today without my mom.”
The family’s statement concluded with a heartfelt tribute: “There was and will be only one Marian Robinson. In our sadness, we are lifted up by the extraordinary gift of her life. And we will spend the rest of our lives trying to live up to her example.”
Credit: NBC
