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A Growing Family

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A Growing Family

On June 10, 2001, Malia became a big sister. Michelle gave birth to our second daughter Sasha short for (Natasha). Michelle and I settled into our as working parents for our young children. Michelle was on staff at the University of Chicago’s hospitals. Michelle was in charge of setting up health clinics for the poor. Her salary was much higher than mines. Michelle salary helped pay off our loans from law school.

I remained in the Illinois Senate, in the 2002 election I was popular among the voters in which no one ran against me. Then on September 11, 2001, the world changed suddenly for me, just as it did for everyone in America. Terrorists flew planes into the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon building in Washington, D.C. The terrorists belong to a Muslim group called Al Qaeda. In early 2002, the United States declared war in Afghanistan where Osama bin Laden, the leader of Al Qaeda, was thought to be hiding. A year later, the country went to war in Iraq.

Once again, I started thinking about running for a higher office. At such an important time, I wanted to be in Washington, helping to make decisions about the country. At that time the US Congress had backed President George Bush in the decision to wage war against Iraq. The president claimed that Iraq had weapons that could destroy the United States. However, I was not convinced that these weapons existed. It turned out that, indeed, they didn’t.

I thought that finding Osama bin Laden was more important than starting a war in Iraq. Early on, he was one of the few politicians who spoke out against the

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