Every so often, I hear it—from intelligent, well-meaning Black folks; from white people looking for political cover or just drinking the Republican Kool-Aid served hot on Fox News; or worse, from Black men who swear up and down that “[insert name] is not a racist.” And the claim?
“Obama didn’t do anything for Black people.”
It’s delivered with a shrug, a smirk, or just enough conviction to sound like fact.
But it’s not. And the fact that so many repeat it—across race and party lines—makes it all the more urgent to push back.
When you’ve been carrying the weight of 400 years, you want your “first” to do the impossible. To flip the table. To take us all to the mountaintop. But we have to be honest—not just about what Obama did, but about what he was up against, and what we did or didn’t demand.
So here it is—the receipts, the nuance, and the truth.
What Did Obama Actually Do for Black People?
1. The Affordable Care Act (Obamacare)
You can call it policy, I call it protection. The ACA cut the uninsured rate among Black Americans by over 40%—from 19% in 2010 to around 11% by 2016. It expanded Medicaid (where states allowed it), covered pre-existing conditions, and gave folks access to treatment for the very things that had been taking us out for generations: hypertension, diabetes, asthma. That wasn’t a handout. That was a health plan with life on the line.
2. My Brother’s Keeper
Critics said he lectured Black boys. But My Brother’s Keeper was more than words—it was structure. Obama launched it in 2014 to support boys and young men of color through mentoring, job training, and educational opportunity.
Here’s the genius part: he made it a public-private partnership, so corporate donors carried most of the funding load. That meant Congress couldn’t kill it, even if they wanted to.
Learn more here: My Brother’s Keeper Alliance (Obama Foundation)
“I always tell young people in particular: Do not say that nothing’s changed when it comes to race in America, unless you lived through being a Black man in the 1950s or ’60s or ’70s. It is incontrovertible that race relations have improved, but we have more work to do.”
—Barack Obama, Howard University Commencement, 2016
Obama never claimed to be a messiah. He led a country that questioned his birth certificate, his legitimacy, and even his wife’s humanity. That he got anything done at all is a study in political chess.
3. Criminal Justice Reform
While Congress stalled, Obama commuted over 1,700 federal prison sentences—mostly for nonviolent drug offenses. That’s more than the last 13 presidents combined.
He also launched DOJ investigations into abusive police departments (Ferguson, Cleveland, Baltimore), banned juvenile solitary confinement in federal prisons, and shifted the conversation around mass incarceration into mainstream policy debates.
4. Support for Black Institutions
He directed over $1 billion to HBCUs, expanded Pell Grants, and increased access to college for low-income and first-generation students—many of them Black.
Under Obama, Black-owned businesses saw a rise in federal contracts and SBA loans, helping some to scale or survive during the recession. The recovery wasn’t perfect, but it wasn’t absent either.
5. Presence and Power
Let’s not play small here—symbolism matters. Michelle Obama walking into Buckingham Palace with cornrows beneath her hat? That shook people. His Cabinet, his judicial appointments, his two little Black girls chasing each other through the White House halls—that mattered.
Not just to us, but to every white supremacist who clutched their pearls and tried to rewrite the rules once they saw a Black man sitting at the Resolute Desk.
“But He Did More for the Asians and LGBTQ+ Community…”
Yes, I’ve heard this one too.
Obama signed the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, supported marriage equality, and stood against anti-Asian hate. That’s true.
But I always ask this:
What exactly did Black folks ask for?
The LGBTQ+ community organized around very clear, very specific policy goals. Marriage equality. Legal protections. Anti-discrimination laws. Asian communities mobilized for hate crime protections. They made it known.
Meanwhile, we—Black America—weren’t unified in what we demanded. Some wanted reparations. Others wanted education reform. Some wanted justice reform. Others just wanted him to go full Malcolm in the Oval Office.
You can’t pass legislation for vibes. And no president, no matter how Black, can respond to scattered demands with a unified bill.
In his memoir, Obama owned the criticism—and the constraint. He knew what people wanted. But he also knew the math. You can’t pass a bill with no votes. And the America he inherited didn’t suddenly become post-racial in 2008. If anything, his presidency exposed just how deep the resistance really goes.
“I understand the temptation to want a Black president to champion only Black causes. But that’s not how America works. If I had spent all my time talking about how Black folks were getting the shaft, I wouldn’t have gotten anything done.”
—Barack Obama, A Promised Land (2020)
In his memoir, Obama owned the criticism—and the constraint. He knew what people wanted. But he also knew the math. You can’t pass a bill with no votes.
And the America he inherited didn’t suddenly become post-racial in 2008. If anything, his presidency exposed just how deep the resistance really goes.
Final Word
So the next time someone hits you with “Obama didn’t do anything for Black people,” ask them this:
“What did we ask for, and who tried to stop him when he did?”
Because the receipts are here. The record is real. And the truth is this:
Obama did what he could with what he had—and what he built is still holding up.
It’s fact, don’t let anybody no matter the color tell you differently, if we keep letting them erase truth and the success of our people and letting them convince you that facts don’t matter…eventually they won’t.
