Protesters raged, critics mocked — now Obama says his library’s actually opening
Former President Barack Obama's much-maligned presidential center will officially open in June in Chicago after years of delays and protests, the former president revealed. "We’re going to open in June...
By Fox News · Fox News
Former President Barack Obama 's much-maligned presidential center will officially open in June in Chicago after years of delays and protests, the former president revealed. "We’re going to open in June so that y’all don’t have to bring your coats up," Obama said during a visit to the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Arkansas on Monday, without revealing a firm opening date, according to the Chicago Sun-Times . The presidential center has been in the works for more than a decade, with the Obama Foundation announcing the site on Chicago’s South Side back in May 2015. The center, which will include the presidential library, was projected to open in 2021, but has been tied up in lawsuits and federal reviews that have pushed the timeline back years. TRUMP PUSHES BACK AFTER MICHELLE OBAMA KNOCKS EAST WING RENOVATION, CALLING OLD ARRANGEMENT ‘A DISASTER' The center will be home to the presidential library, a museum, auditorium, a Chicago Public Library branch, a garden, athletic facility and other attractions on its 20-acre campus. "We want to create a campus, a place where the public gathers for a range of things that puts them face to face with each other and get them to meet and be in dialogue and conversation and exposed to new ideas with each other," Obama said on Monday, according to the Chicago Sun -Times. CHICAGO RESIDENTS CALL OBAMA PRESIDENTIAL CENTER A 'MONSTROSITY,' FEAR THEY'LL BE DISPLACED: REPORT The $850 million project in Jackson Park was first hit with a years-long lawsuit in 2018 when a group called Protect Our Parks alleged that Chicago illegally transferred parkland to the private Obama Foundation. That court battle persisted until 2022, when a federal judge terminated a revised version of the suit. The planned construction also sparked federal reviews as the project required an overhaul of roads in the area and due to Jackson Park being listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Such reviews did not wrap up until late 2020, local m…