At the age of 55, after two terms at the head of the White House, Barack Obama leaves the top job of US policy on Tuesday. The Democrat chose the city of Chicago, land of his meteoric rise in public life in the country, to speak for the last time as president of the United States. The Democrat will hand over the job to Republican Donald Trump on Jan. 20.
According to Chicago SunTimes.Accompanied by his wife, Michelle, and Vice President Joe Biden, Obama will speak at McCormick Place in the heart of northern Illinois. The entries for the speech are free and were disputed in the early hours of Saturday, in front of the conference center where hundreds of people queued, despite the freezing cold.
A few blocks away, in Grant Park, is a huge public park jammed between Lake Michigan and skyscrapers, where Obama spoke on the night of his first victory on November 5, 2008.
"It was necessary a long time. But tonight, thanks to what we won today and achieved during this election, at this historic moment, change has come” – had said the first black president in the US history after his crushing victory over the Republican opponent John McCain.
Obama's speech will not be anti-Trump
Eight years ahead of the world's first power whitened his hair and thinned his face, but Obama intends to send once again a message of hope. The outgoing President wants to thank the Americans for "this extraordinary adventure" and "to express some reflections" about the future.
"This is a separate speech, there is no pre-defined scheme," explained Cody Keenan, speechwriter for Barack Obama, who claims to have read all his predecessors in a tradition dating back to George Washington.
Since Obama intends to talk about his career and present "his vision of America," "it will not be an anti-Trump speech," the writer says.
Speaking about the future without criticizing the successor in the name of a peaceful political transition, however, promises to be a balancing act for the one who said during the campaign that progress over the past eight years "would vanish like smoke" in case of the real estate tycoon's victory.
On this Wednesday Donald Trump will attend the first press conference since the November 8 election in New York.
