At Barack Obama’s first inauguration, in 2009, the 44th President of the United States gave his first official speech to the American public: “On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.” Nearly a decade later, the First Lady Michelle Obama recalled that fateful day on the National Mall in her 2018 memoir, Becoming. “There were people in every direction, as far back as I could see,” she wrote.