--- title: 'Rising Star' by David Garrow Review: A Look at Obama's Exes description: "Rising Star: The Making of Barack Obama" by David J. Garrow investigates the former President through the eyes of an ex-girlfriend canonical: https://time.com/4775440/all-the-presidents-exes/ author: Sarah Begley article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-05-11T10:34:36.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T04:52:14.150Z article:section: Ideas og:title: All the President's Exes og:description: A review of David J. Garrow's haute-tabloid tome on Barack Obama og:url: https://time.com/4775440/all-the-presidents-exes/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf99aa86cb5978f13/6988ccd20b72e331316edba8/barack-obama-rising-star.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2650 og:image:height: 1491 og:image:alt: barack-obama-rising-star og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: All the President's Exes twitter:description: A review of David J. Garrow's haute-tabloid tome on Barack Obama twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf99aa86cb5978f13/6988ccd20b72e331316edba8/barack-obama-rising-star.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # All the President's Exes > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. 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A paid TIME subscription is separate and available at time.com/subscribe-agent. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-inside-2026q3/newsletters?i=76b52af5-1e2b-4a31-b832-819c7213cf82&cr=time-nl-inside-2026q3-v1) by [Sarah Begley](https://time.com/author/sarah-begley/) ## Sarah Begley May 11, 2017 10:34 AM UTC  by [Sarah Begley](https://time.com/author/sarah-begley/) ## Sarah Begley May 11, 2017 10:34 AM UTC David J. Garrow’s [_Rising Star: The Making of Barack Obama_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0062641832/?tag=timecom-20), a 1,460-page haute-tabloid tome, came under critical fire before it was even released this month. One glaring issue for the author of a Pulitzer-winning Martin Luther King Jr. biography: his treatment of the race and love life of the 20-something who would go on to become President. The author relies heavily on interviews with a former girlfriend, Sheila Miyoshi Jager, with whom Obama lived in the 1980s, as if that relationship were the key to understanding his personality. Obama’s split from her is framed as a rejection of white women (Jager is half-Japanese) in favor of the optics that would come from having a black wife. Although Garrow details the sexual chemistry between Obama and his white girlfriends, the former President’s relationship with [Michelle Obama](http://time.com/4758782/michelle-obama-run-for-office-elected/) is presented as businesslike. Observers of the Obamas’ 25-year marriage will find the characterization of their romance as merely political plainly out of touch. Despite Obama’s many achievements as an adult, _Rising Star_‘s epilogue returns to Jager, who claimed in 2014 that “something changed in him after we went our separate ways … as if the part of him that was so vulnerable and open (and sensual?) went underground … raging ambition, quest for greatness, whatever just took over instead.” Would that we could all take credit for our exes’ success after being left behind. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4775440/all-the-presidents-exes/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4775440/all-the-presidents-exes/"},"headline":"All the President's Exes","datePublished":"2017-05-11T10:34:36.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T04:52:14.150Z","description":"\"Rising Star: The Making of Barack Obama\" by David J. 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