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After eight years serving as the first lady of the United States, Michelle Obama left the White House beloved in the eyes of most Americans. According to Gallup, her favorability rating was 69%, well above that of her husband, President Barack Obama, as well as virtually all other national political figures (McCarthy 2017). Americans’ affection for Michelle Obama was not limited to a sense of nostalgia as she and her husband were about to leave the White House. On the contrary, her favorability ratings remained in the high 60s throughout her tenure in the national spotlight (McCarthy 2017).
Since first ladies have become objects of interest in public opinion surveys, being well liked by the American public is not in and of itself an unusual phenomenon for them. Michelle Obama's predecessor, First Lady Laura Bush, also enjoyed high favorable ratings throughout her husband's two terms as president. Although polls were conducted less frequently during her tenure, Barbara Bush retains the status as the most beloved first lady of the modern era (Elder, Frederick, and Burrell 2018, chap. 2). On the other hand, popularity is not automatically inherited with the title of first lady. During her eight years in the role, Hillary Clinton experienced the lowest favorability ratings of modern first ladies (Prysby and Scavo 2001; Troy 2006). Her approval ratings even dipped below the approval ratings of her husband, President Bill Clinton, an unusual development for a first lady (Burrell 2000, 2001). First Lady Melania Trump has also struggled to win the public's approval (Elder, Frederick, and Burrell 2018).
What is remarkable about the goodwill so many Americans express toward First Lady Michelle Obama is that she was able to maintain high favorable evaluations through a period of political, social, and electoral acrimony that made high approval ratings for national political figures increasingly unlikely. Throughout President Obama's two terms in office, our nation saw greater partisan and ideological polarization (Abramowitz 2018; Abramowitz and Webster 2016; Campbell 2016; Jacobson 2017; Webster and Abramowitz 2017), continuing declines in trust in government (Hetherington and Rudolph 2015), increasing income inequality (McCarty, Poole, and Rosenthal 2016), and negative reactions among large pockets of Americans to the changing social and demographic landscape of American society (Jones 2017; Parker and Barreto 2013)....