Former President Barack Obama teamed up with Nike to help build a brand new athletic facility at the Obama Presidential Center. The Nike-funded community center maintains the “open feel” of the presidential center, which is housed at Chicago’s Jackson Park, and includes a museum, library, and a forum for public meetings.
“The very presence of an athletic facility underlines how much the power of sport is woven into President and Mrs. Obama’s identities,” Nike’s Chief Social and Community Impact Officer Jorge Casimiro shared via Nike.com. “President Obama, after all, is famous for his NCAA brackets and his love of the White Sox, and the Obama family inspired kids everywhere to get moving.”
The Obama’s personally donated more than $1 million to the facility which has so far raised around $400 million in private donor donations since 2017.
“It’s all part of a new kind of presidential center: a place to inspire, a place to learn and a place to reflect, but also — as befitting a president who brought his love of hoops from the South Side of Chicago to the South Lawn of the White House — a place to grab some friends and get active,” added Casimiro. “As President Obama declared when he unveiled his plans for the center, “It wouldn’t be the Obama Presidential Center without a place to play some ball.”
The Obama Presidential Center is scheduled to open in 2021.