WASHINGTON – Former first lady Michelle Obama’s mother, Marian Robinson, has died, her family told NBC News. Robinson was 86 years old.
“He passed peacefully this morning and now none of us are quite sure how to carry on without him,” the family said in a statement.
The family statement is from Michelle and Barack Obama; Craig Robinson and wife Kelly; and grandchildren Avery, Leslie, Malia, Sasha, Austin and Aaron to Marian Robinson.
After her son-in-law Barack Obama won the 2008 presidential election, Robinson became known to Americans as the country’s first grandmother. He was a fixture in the White House during his eight years in office, although he kept a low profile. He participated in holiday events, occasional trips abroad and concerts in the East Room. But most of all he was with his grandchildren Sasha and Malia.
A lifelong Chicago resident, Robinson agreed to move to Washington in 2009 to live in the White House residence and care for her grandchildren, who were then seven and 10 years old.
“I felt like it was going to be a very difficult life for both of them,” he later said on CBS interview, referring to his daughter and son-in-law. “And I was worried about their safety, and I was worried about my grandchildren. It made me want to move to DC.”
In a statement Friday, Robinson’s family members said he agreed to leave Chicago with a “healthy nudge.”
“We need her. The girls need her. And she’s been our rock through it all,” they said.
“She relished her role as grandma… And while she enforced whatever household rules we set for sleeping, watching TV, or eating candy, she made it clear that she sided with her ‘grandmas’ and thought their parents were helping them. Too much.” it is tough,” they added.
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 died of multiple sclerosis in 1991.
The former president once called his mother-in-law “the most ambitious person I know.” Indeed, Robinson said in an interview with CBS that it was a “huge adjustment” anticipated by the White House residence staff, who said he believed in allowing them to do their own laundry.
“Rather than dealing with Oscar and Nobel laureates, he preferred to spend his time upstairs in a room with a television tray and large windows outside his bedroom overlooking the Washington Monument,” the family said in a statement Friday. “The only visitor he wanted to meet was the Pope.”
The former president credited Robinson for keeping his daughters occupied while they were growing up in the White House.
“He’s down to Earth and he doesn’t understand all the fuss,” she said interview on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.”
Michelle Obama was very close to her mother. It was Robinson narrated A biographical video introducing his daughter at the 2008 Democratic National Convention. And after leaving the White House, Robinson said, “My word is, when I grow up, I want to be like Michelle Obama.”
Just a few weeks ago, Michelle Obama paid tribute to her mother on Mother’s Day announces The exhibition to be opened at the Obama Presidential Center Museum in Chicago will bear his name.
“In many ways, she taught me how to think for myself, how to use my own voice, and understand my own worth, instilling in me a deep sense of confidence in who I am and who I can be,” she said. the first lady said in a video announcement. “I wouldn’t be who I am today without my mom.”
“There was and will be only one Marian Robinson,” the family said in a statement released Friday, adding: “In our grief, we are lifted by the extraordinary gift of her life. We will strive to live the rest of our lives by her example.”