Next Year in the White House: Barack Obama’s First Presidential Seder

In the weeks leading up to Passover 2008, Barack Obama’s campaign was in freefall. His polling numbers were fading, and Jews were abandoning him after ABC News reported inflammatory statements previously made by his pastor, Jeremiah Wright. Even his friends were saying he was a candidate with “no chance, no money, and a funny name.”

Meanwhile, three of his youngest aides, Eric Lesser, Herbie Ziskend, and Arun Chaudhary, were homesick, hungry, and tired. They had been on the “Hope” campaign trail for almost a year, and the travel logistics meant that that they would not get home to celebrate the first night’s seder with their families.

That afternoon, as they left Philadelphia for yet another evening rally, Eric had an idea. He called his cousin, who attended the nearby University of Pennsylvania, and “borrowed” some Maxwell House Haggadahs, a bottle of Manischewitz wine, two cans of macaroons, and a box of matzoh from the Hillel House.

Arriving in Harrisburg, Eric found an empty room in the basement of their hotel. It was small, dark, and dingy, and two stories underground, but he invited his two friends to join him.

In many Jewish family seders, a door is left slightly ajar, and an extra cup of wine is set on the table in the hope that the prophet Elijah will return to earth to usher in an era of peace. An open door is also a sign that anyone who is hungry is welcome to come and eat. The tradition likely started in the Middle Ages when Jews, falsely accused of using the blood of Christian children to flavor their Matzoh, wanted the local authorities to know they had nothing to hide.

The three friends began to tell the story of Exodus, which is at the heart of every Passover Seder. They remembered the bitter tears the enslaved Israelites shed, and their ancestors’ daring escape from Egypt.

Suddenly, there was a knock on the door.

When candidate Barack Obama entered the room, he too was homesick, hungry, and tired. By all rights he should have ordered room service and gone to bed. But here is the measure of the man. Obama did not show up in an attempt to curry favor with Jewish voters. There were no reporters in the room. This was a private moment of kindness and support for his young staff. Plus a message to them that he would not give up hope, and neither should they.

After the Senator took his seat at the table, he was joined by a small circle of his closest senior advisors and longtime friends: Valerie Jarrett, Reggie Love, Cookie Offerman, Jen Psaki, Samantha Tubman, and Eric Whitaker.

The Exodus story has a special place in many Black churches and has long resonated with Civil Rights heroes, who have found inspiration in the many links between the history of the Jewish people, and their own. Harriet Tubman, who helped many enslaved Black people to escape to freedom through the Underground Railroad was called “the Moses of her people.” Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. regularly quoted the biblical narrative of Exodus, and before his assassination he had accepted an invitation to share the coming Passover Seder at the home of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, who had marched with him from Selma to Montgomery.

The guests all took turns reading from the Haggadah. When Eric read about the Pharaoh forcing enslaved Israelites to build his stone cities of Pithom and Raames, Obama reflected on the enslaved Black laborers who laid the logs and stones for America’s White House.
“The odds were against the Israelites,” he noted. “But patience and hope kept them going. They believed in hard work and miracles.”

It was almost midnight when Eric raised his glass with the hopeful expression of better days ahead that end every Seder around the world: “Next Year in Jerusalem.”

Obama then raised up his glass a second time. “Next Year in the White House.”

It was one year later when Eric was working as chief of staff for David Axelrod, that the President walked past his cubicle and asked, “Well, Lesser,” shall we do it again.”

In 1800, President John Adams held the first formal Christmas dinner at the newly built White House. In 1878, President Rutherford B Hayes observed Easter with a public “Egg Roll.” But 2009 was the first time that a United States president officially celebrated Passover. And this is how it happened that the descendants of two enslaved peoples were free to share a meal together in the White House at the invitation of America’s first Black president.

The dinner would become a tradition for the following seven years. After the Haggadah reading was concluded, President Obama and his guests would read the Emancipation Proclamation aloud.

Seder in the White House by E.B. Lewis

According to the Haggadah, we should try to imagine ourselves as if we were the ones wandering through the desert, frightened, and not knowing where we are headed. We are all part of the story, and we repeat it each year because it is a story that is never finished.
This year that directive seems more pertinent than ever. Too many of us are scared, hungry, and tired. Patience is hard to come by.

As Moses learned when he came down the mountain with the first set of God’s words, there will always be those who prefer to worship the Golden Calf. But Passover reminds us that there are also those who believe in both hard work and miracles; those who, when things look hopeless, are willing to risk their lives for freedom, even if it takes 40 years of wandering through the unknown, and they themselves do not get to enter the promised land.

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Richard Michelson’s picture book, Next Year the White House: Barack Obama’s First Presidential Seder, was published on March 4, 2025.

Eric Lesser went on to serve in the Massachusetts State Senate.

Herbie Ziskend served as White House Principal Deputy Communications Director in the Biden administration and as senior communications advisor for Vice President Kamala Harris.

Arun Chaudhary was the first official videographer of the White House and later served as Creative Director for Senator Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign.