The former first lady joined the rock icon onstage during his concert April 28 in Barcelona, Spain. She sang the background vocals and jammed on a tambourine alongside Springsteen during his performance of “Glory Days.”

The “Becoming” author performed in a purple ensemble with a black blazer overtop. She was all smiles and sang passionately into the mic alongside actor Kate Capshaw and band member Patti Scialfa.

Alfonso Gomis Duyos, @todoestoexiste on Twitter, shared the sweet moment on social media and captioned the video, “Wow there! @MichelleObama giving it everything” in Spanish.

Michelle Obama and her husband, Barack Obama, were in Barcelona with Steven Spielberg, who is married to Capshaw, for the Springsteen concert. According to Reuters, the group visited some of the city’s famous sites, including the Sagrada Família basilica and the Picasso museum, before the show Friday.

Springsteen, Spielberg and Barack Obama also had dinner together at the Amar restaurant April 27, according to Reuters.

Springsteen and Barack Obama are longtime friends. The singer performed at rallies for the then-presidential candidate during his 2008 campaign. Barack Obama also awarded Springsteen the nation’s highest honor for civilians, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, in 2016.

In 2021, the two teamed up to record a podcast together called “Renegades: Born in the USA,” in which they discussed the origins of their friendship, race in the U.S. and fatherhood.

Friday’s concert comes as Springsteen kicked off his international tour, following a concert in Newark, New Jersey, April 14, which wrapped his U.S. concert series. Springsteen and the E Street Band play next April 30 in Barcelona before heading to Dublin, Ireland.

“Glory Days” is one of the hits from Springsteen’s “Born in the U.S.A.” album, released in 1984. The song was one of seven singles from the album to break the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1985.

Michelle Obama wasn’t the only one to add flair to “Glory Days” in April. Kelly Clarkson and Charles Esten gave the song a country twang when they performed it together during the “Kellyoke” segment of her show April 10.

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Audible announced Wednesday that the former first lady will launch the “Michelle Obama: The Light Podcast” on March 7. It’s based on Obama’s tour promoting “The Light We Carry,” her recent bestselling book, which featured special guests like Oprah Winfrey, Ellen DeGeneres, Tyler Perry, David Letterman and more.

“Though only a few thousand people were able to attend the events live, these remarkable conversations can now be heard by everyone,” Audible said in a news release. The eight-episode podcast “goes beyond the book as Michelle Obama and her friends share personal stories and insights listeners won’t encounter anywhere else.”

Obama said in a statement that the book tour was a way to expand on the book’s reflections about dealing with stress and change and a chance to “connect with real people once again.” The podcast, she said, is “a deeper examination of those fun and meaningful moments.”

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Obama released “The Light We Carry” book on Nov. 15, and kicked off her promotional tour the same night. She was joined in Washington for the first event by DeGeneres.

The podcast is the first original project in a multiyear deal between Audible and Higher Ground Productions, which was started by Barack and Michelle Obama after they left the White House. The company has produced several acclaimed documentaries, including the Oscar-winning film “American Factory.”

Episodes of “The Light Podcast” will be an Audible exclusive for two weeks, and will be widely available on other podcast platforms after that.

Michelle Obama receives more than 2,000 letters a month from readers responding to her 2018 memoir, “Becoming.”

Obama says these letters inspired her new book, “The Light We Carry,” and the former first lady was able to meet one of the people behind the words on TODAY with Hoda & Jenna.

In a video, Irene Dimatulac read from the letter she wrote Obama while she was battling osteosarcoma, a bone cancer, in her left leg.

“My cancer journey so far has been harrowing, with so much pain, fear of the world outside and with the pressures to be strong in this hard time,” she wrote.

“All of these details to say, your book has been a boon on what could be a lonely journey,” Dimatulac continued. “On days where chemotherapy made it hard to even focus on watching TV, I could get lost in listening to you narrate your book.”

Dimatulac, 25, shared in the letter she had professional portraits taken to “challenge the negative voices in my head and to embrace my journey.” She sent the photos to Obama to share how proud she was of them.

“And I hope that you are proud of me too,” she wrote. “You, Mrs. Obama, have been as much a supporter of me on my cancer journey as anyone in my life. Thank you, and I hope this email brings you some joy, as you have touched another young life deeply.”

After the video wrapped, Dimatulac was introduced onstage and met the author who helped her through her cancer journey.

“I got to walk over to you,” Dimatulac said to Obama.

“You did! You did that,” Obama said, adding the letters she receives from readers like Dimatulac makes her feel like it’s all worth it.

“Well, you know, it makes it all worthwhile, and that’s the power of ‘The Light We Carry,'” Obama said. “You know, if you can see it in yourself, you can spread it to somebody else and you will never know whose life it will change and whose life you’re changing in the process of sharing your story.”

“So you’re pretty awesome,” she told Dimatulac.

“I’m going to put that on my LinkedIn,” Dimatulac responded with a smile.

TODAY co-anchor Hoda Kotb then revealed not only was Dimatulac meeting Obama, she was also getting a reunion with some of her medical team from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.

Five of her doctors and nurses then jumped up from their seats in the audience, leading Dimatulac to say her contact lenses were fogging up.

“My contacts are foggy and I’m not even wearing contacts,” TODAY’s Jenna Bush Hager agreed.

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The former first lady, 58, opened up to People about her menopause experience in an effort to remove the stigma from publicly discussing hormone changes in women’s bodies. “There is not a lot of conversation about menopause. I’m going through it, and I know all of my friends are going through it. And the information is sparse,” she explained.

The Chicago-born attorney revealed when she lived at the White House with her husband, former President Barack Obama, she and her closest friends participated in self-styled fitness “boot camps.” 

Now, the friends — who teasingly called Obama the “Drillmaster” — lean on each other as they navigate menopause together.

“I find that when we get together and we’re moving and we’re laughing, then we spend a little time talking about what we’re going through. ‘What’s a hot flash?’” she said. “We have girlfriends around the table who are OBGYNs, who have real information. All of that keeps us lifted up.”

As she’s grown older, said Obama, her fitness workouts have changed. “Some of it is menopause, some of it is aging,” she explained. “I find that I cannot push myself as hard as I used to. That doesn’t work out for me. That when I tear a muscle or pull something and then I’m out. The recovery time is not the same.”

Obama now focuses on stretching to stay flexible rather than pushing herself with strenuous cardio workouts. “You wind up balancing between staying fit enough and being kind enough on your body to stay in the game,” she said.

Like many women in menopause, Obama and some of her boot camp pals have put on weight.

“I never used to weigh myself. I’m not trying to stick to numbers, but when you’re in menopause, you have this slow creep that you just don’t realize,” said Obama. “We’re all in menopause with stretchy (waist) bands and our athleisure wear on, and you look up and you can’t fit the outfits you had last year.”

As for monitoring her weight gain, she said, “I have to be more mindful, not obsessive, but more mindful.”

Obama also told People that, all in all, she feels “blessed” during this time of life. “I think my skin still feels healthy. My hair is still in my head. These are the things that I have to count my blessings for,” she said.

“I am still physically active,” she added, “and my goal now, instead of having ‘Michelle Obama arms,’ I just want to keep moving.”

In August 2020, Obama opened up about going through menopause on the “Michelle Obama Podcast,” where she revealed that she began using hormone replacement therapy (HRT) while living in the White House.

“I had a few (hot flashes) before I started taking hormones,” Obama explained. “I remember having one on Marine One. I’m dressed, I need to go out, walk into an event, and literally it was like somebody put a furnace in my core and turned it on high and then everything started melting. I thought ‘Well, this is crazy. I can’t do this.’”

Obama said several women on her husband’s White House staff were also experiencing hot flashes and other signs of hormone changes. So she decided to tell the president what was happening in the lives of the women around him.

“He could see it in somebody, because sweat would just start pouring, and he’s like ‘Well, what’s going on?’ And it’s like, no, this is just how we live,” Obama recalled. “He didn’t fall apart because he found out there were several women in his staff that were going through menopause. It was just sort of like, ‘Oh, well, turn the air conditioner.’”

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The former first lady, 58, opened up to People about her menopause experience in an effort to remove the stigma from publicly discussing hormone changes in women’s bodies. “There is not a lot of conversation about menopause. I’m going through it, and I know all of my friends are going through it. And the information is sparse,” she explained.

The Chicago-born attorney revealed when she lived at the White House with her husband, former President Barack Obama, she and her closest friends participated in self-styled fitness “boot camps.”

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Now, the friends — who teasingly called Obama the “Drillmaster” — lean on each other as they navigate menopause together.

“I find that when we get together and we’re moving and we’re laughing, then we spend a little time talking about what we’re going through. ‘What’s a hot flash?’” she said. “We have girlfriends around the table who are OBGYNs, who have real information. All of that keeps us lifted up.”

As she’s grown older, said Obama, her fitness workouts have changed. “Some of it is menopause, some of it is aging,” she explained. “I find that I cannot push myself as hard as I used to. That doesn’t work out for me. That when I tear a muscle or pull something and then I’m out. The recovery time is not the same.”

Obama now focuses on stretching to stay flexible rather than pushing herself with strenuous cardio workouts. “You wind up balancing between staying fit enough and being kind enough on your body to stay in the game,” she said.

Like many women in menopause, Obama and some of her boot camp pals have put on weight.

“I never used to weigh myself. I’m not trying to stick to numbers, but when you’re in menopause, you have this slow creep that you just don’t realize,” said Obama. “We’re all in menopause with stretchy (waist) bands and our athleisure wear on, and you look up and you can’t fit the outfits you had last year.”

As for monitoring her weight gain, she said, “I have to be more mindful, not obsessive, but more mindful.”

Obama also told People that, all in all, she feels “blessed” during this time of life. “I think my skin still feels healthy. My hair is still in my head. These are the things that I have to count my blessings for,” she said.

“I am still physically active,” she added, “and my goal now, instead of having ‘Michelle Obama arms,’ I just want to keep moving.”

In August 2020, Obama opened up about going through menopause on the “Michelle Obama Podcast,” where she revealed that she began using hormone replacement therapy (HRT) while living in the White House.

“I had a few (hot flashes) before I started taking hormones,” Obama explained. “I remember having one on Marine One. I’m dressed, I need to go out, walk into an event, and literally, it was like somebody put a furnace in my core and turned it on high, and then everything started melting. I thought ‘Well, this is crazy. I can’t do this.’”

Obama said several women on her husband’s White House staff were also experiencing hot flashes and other signs of hormone changes. So she decided to tell the president what was happening in the lives of the women around him.

“He could see it in somebody because sweat would just start pouring, and he’s like ‘Well, what’s going on?’ And it’s like, no, this is just how we live,” Obama recalled. “He didn’t fall apart because he found out there were several women in his staff that were going through menopause. It was just sort of like, ‘Oh, well, turn the air conditioner.’”

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While her husband cracked a few jokes about his gray hair, big ears and clothes in his portrait, Mrs. Obama, a descendant of slaves, said the occasion for her was more about the promise of America for people like herself.

“Barack and Michelle, welcome home,” declared President Joe Biden as the gathering cheered.

Biden, who was Obama’s vice president, praised his former boss’ leadership on health care, the economy and immigration and said nothing could have prepared him any better for being president than serving with Obama for those eight years.

“It was always about doing what was right,” he said.

The portrait of Obama, America’s 44th and first Black president, doesn’t look like any of his predecessors, nor does Michelle Obama’s look like any of the women who filled the role before her.

Obama stands expressionless against a white background, wearing a black suit and gray tie in the portrait by Robert McCurdy that looks more like a large photograph than an oil-on-canvas portrait. The former first lady, her lips pursed, is seated on a sofa in the Red Room in a strapless, light blue dress. She chose artist Sharon Sprung for her portrait.

Scores of former members of Obama’s administration were on hand for the big reveal.

Obama noted that some of them in the East Room audience had started families in the intervening years and feigned disappointment “that I haven’t heard of anyone naming a kid Barack or Michelle.”

He thanked McCurdy for his work, joking that the artist, who is known for his paintings of public figures from Nelson Mandela to the Dalai Lama, had ignored his pleas for fewer gray hairs and smaller ears. “He also talked me out of wearing a tan suit, by the way,” Obama quipped, referring to a widely panned appearance as president in the unflattering suit.

Obama went on to say his wife was the “best thing about living in the White House,” and he thanked Sprung for “capturing everything I love about Michelle, her grace, her intelligence — and the fact that she’s fine.”

Michelle Obama, when it was her turn, laughingly opened by saying she had to thank her husband for “such spicy remarks.” To which he retorted, by way of explanation, “I’m not running again.”

Then the former first lady turned serious, drawing a connection between unveiling the portraits and America’s promise for people with backgrounds like her own, a daughter of working-class parents from the South Side of Chicago.

“For me this day is not just about what has happened,” she said. “It’s also about what could happen, because a girl like me, she was never supposed to be up there next to Jacqueline Kennedy and Dolley Madison. She wasn’t supposed to live in this house, and she wasn’t supposed to serve as first lady.”

Mrs. Obama said the portraits are a “reminder that there’s a place for everyone in this country.”

Tradition holds that the sitting president invites his immediate predecessor back to the White House to unveil his portrait, but Donald Trump broke with that custom and did not host Obama. So, Biden scheduled a ceremony for his former boss.

Mrs. Obama said the tradition matters “not just for those of us who hold these positions but for everyone participating in and watching our democracy.”

In remarks that never mentioned Trump but made a point as he continues to challenge his 2020 reelection loss, she added: “You see the people, they make their voices heard with their vote, we hold an inauguration to ensure a peaceful transition of power … and once our time is up, we move on.”

McCurdy, meanwhile, said his “stripped down” style of portraiture helps create an “encounter” between the person in the painting and the person looking at it.

“They have plain white backgrounds, nobody gestures, nobody — there are no props because we’re not here to tell the story of the person that’s sitting for them,” McCurdy told the White House Historical Association during an interview for its “1600 Sessions” podcast.

“We’re here to create an encounter between the viewer and the sitter,” he said. “We’re telling as little about the sitter as possible so that the viewer can project onto them.”

He works from a photograph of his subject, selected from about 100 images, and spends at least a year on each portrait. Subjects have no say in how the painting looks. McCurdy said he knows he’s done “when it stops irritating me.”

Obama’s portrait is destined for display in the Grand Foyer of the White House, the traditional showcase for paintings of the two most recent presidents. Bill Clinton’s and George W. Bush’s portraits currently hang there.

Mrs. Obama’s portrait likely will be placed with her predecessors along the hallway on the Ground Floor of the White House, joining Barbara Bush, Hillary Clinton and Laura Bush.

Two spokespeople for Trump did not respond to emailed requests for comment on whether artists have begun work on White House portraits for Trump and former first lady Melania Trump. Work, however, is underway on a separate pair of Trump portraits bound for the collection held by the National Portrait Gallery, a Smithsonian museum.

The White House Historical Association, a nonprofit organization founded in 1961 by first lady Jacqueline Kennedy and funded through private donations and sales of books and an annual Christmas ornament, helps manage the White House portrait process. Since the 1960s, the association has paid for most of the portraits in the collection.

Congress bought the first painting in the collection, of George Washington. Other portraits of early presidents and first ladies often came to the White House as gifts.

President Joe Biden and his wife, Jill, are set to revive that ritual — after an awkward and anomalous gap in the Trump years — when they host the Obamas on Wednesday for the big reveal of their portraits in front of scores of friends, family and staff.

The Obama paintings will not look like any in the White House portrait collection to which they will be added. They were America’s first Black president and first lady.

The ceremony will also mark Michelle Obama’s first visit to the White House since Obama’s presidency ended in January 2017, and only the second visit for Barack Obama. He was at the White House in April to mark the 12th anniversary of the health care law he signed in 2010.

Portrait ceremonies often give past presidents an opportunity to showcase their comedic timing.

“I am pleased that my portrait brings an interesting symmetry to the White House collection. It now starts and ends with a George W,” Bush quipped at his ceremony in 2012.

Bill Clinton joked in 2004 that “most of the time, till you get your picture hung like this, the only artists that draw you are cartoonists.”

Recent tradition, no matter the party affiliation, has had the current president genially hosting his immediate predecessor for the unveiling — as Clinton did for George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush did for Clinton and Obama did for the younger Bush.

Then there was an unexplained pause when Donald Trump did not host Obama.

Two spokespeople for Trump did not respond to emailed requests for comment on the lack of a ceremony for Obama, and whether artists are working on portraits of Trump and former first lady Melania Trump.

The White House portrait collection starts with George Washington, America’s first president. Congress bought his portrait.

Other portraits of early presidents and first ladies often came to the White House as gifts. Since the middle of the last century, the White House Historical Association has paid for the paintings.

The first portraits financed by the association were of Lyndon Johnson and Lady Bird Johnson, and John F. Kennedy and Jacqueline Kennedy, said Stewart McLaurin, president of the private, nonprofit organization established by first lady Kennedy.

Before presidents and first ladies leave office, the association explains the portrait process. The former president and first lady choose the artist or artists, and offer guidance on how they want to be portrayed.

“It really involves how that president and first lady see themselves,” McLaurin said in an interview with The Associated Press.

The collection includes an iconic, full-length portrait of Washington that adorns the East Room. It is the only item still in the White House that was in the executive mansion in November 1800 when John Adams and Abigail Adams became the first president and first lady to live in the White House.

Years later, first lady Dolley Madison saved Gilbert Stuart’s portrait of Washington from almost certain ruin. She had White House staff take it out of the city before advancing British forces burned the mansion in 1814. The painting was held in storage until the White House was rebuilt.

President and first lady portraits are seen by millions of White House visitors, though not all are on display. Some are undergoing conservation or are in storage.

Those that are on display line hallways and rooms in public areas of the mansion, such as the Ground Floor and its Vermeil and China Rooms, and the State Floor one level above, which has the famous Green, Blue and Red Rooms, the East Room and State Dining Room.

Portraits of Mamie Eisenhower, Pat Nixon, Lady Bird Johnson and Lou Henry Hoover grace the Vermeil Room, along with a full-length image of Jacqueline Kennedy. Michelle Obama’s portrait likely will join Barbara Bush, Hillary Clinton and Laura Bush along the Ground Floor hallway.

The State Floor hallway one floor above features recent presidents: John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush. Gerald Ford’s portrait and the likeness of Richard Nixon — the only president to resign from office — are on view on the Grand Staircase leading to the private living quarters on the second floor.

Past presidents’ images move around the White House, depending on their standing with the current occupants. Ronald Reagan, for example, moved Thomas Jefferson and Harry S. Truman out of the Cabinet Room and swapped in Dwight Eisenhower and Calvin Coolidge.

In the Clinton era, portraits of Richard Nixon and Reagan, idols of the Republican Party, lost their showcase spot in the Grand Foyer and were replaced with pictures of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Truman, heroes of the Democrats. Nancy Reagan temporarily moved Eleanor Roosevelt to a place of prominence in the East Room in 1984 to mark the centennial of her birth.

One of the most prominent spots for a portrait is above the mantle in the State Dining Room and it has been occupied for decades by a painting of a seated Abraham Lincoln, hand supporting his chin. It was placed there by Franklin Roosevelt.

Bill Clinton’s and George W. Bush’s portraits hang on opposing walls in the Grand Foyer.

Clinton’s would be relocated to make room for Barack Obama’s if the White House sticks to tradition and keeps the two most recent Oval Office occupants there, McLaurin said.

“That’s up to the White House, to the curators,” he said.

The association, which is funded through private donations and the sale of books and an annual White House Christmas ornament, keeps the portrait price well below market value because of the “extraordinary honor” an artist derives from having “their work of art hanging perpetually in the White House,” McLaurin said.

Details about the Obamas’ portraits will stay under wraps until Wednesday.

Biden will be the rare president to host a former boss for the unveiling; he was Obama’s vice president. George H.W. Bush, who held Ronald Reagan’s ceremony, was Reagan’s No. 2.

Betty Monkman, a former White House curator, said during a 2017 podcast for the White House Historical Association that the ceremony is a “statement of generosity” by the president and first lady. “It’s a very warm, lovely moment.”

The White House portraits are one of two sets of portraits of presidents and first ladies. The National Portrait Gallery, a Smithsonian museum, maintains its own collection and those portraits are unveiled before the White House pair. The Obamas’ unveiled their museum portraits in February 2018.

Linda St. Thomas, chief spokesperson for the Smithsonian Institution, said in an email that a $650,000 donation in July from Save America, Trump’s political action committee, was earmarked for the couple’s museum portraits. Two artists have been commissioned, one for each painting, and work has begun, St. Thomas said.

The traditional East Room ceremony unveiling the Obamas’ portraits, usually a moment where the sitting president and first lady fête their immediate predecessors, was put off while then-President Donald Trump was in office given the bitter, estranged relationship between the two men. 

Because of Covid, the event was further delayed after Biden took office last year. It’s typically held indoors in the East Room of the White House.

For more on this story, go to NBC News.

It’s the former first lady’s first entirely new work since the 2018 release of her acclaimed blockbuster “Becoming,” which has sold more than 17 million copies worldwide, surpassing the sales of any memoir by a previous first lady or modern president, including her husband, former President Barack Obama.

“I’ve learned it’s okay to recognize that self-worth comes wrapped in vulnerability, and that what we share as humans on this earth is the impulse to strive for better, always and no matter what,” Michelle Obama writes in the book’s introduction, included in Thursday’s announcement by the Random House Publishing Group and its imprint Crown.

“We become bolder in brightness. If you know your light, you know yourself. You know your own story in an honest way. In my experience, this type of self-knowledge builds confidence, which in turn breeds calmness and an ability to maintain perspective, which leads, finally, to being able to connect meaningfully with others — and this to me is the bedrock of all things.”

The new book is not part of the reported eight-figure deal the Obamas reached in 2017, shortly after he left office, with parent company Penguin Random House for their respective memoirs. A spokesperson declined to discuss financial terms for “The Light We Carry.”

Crown will publish the 336-page book Nov. 15, almost exactly four years after the release of “Becoming,” and has announced a first printing of 2.75 million copies for the U.S. and Canada. “The Light We Carry: Overcoming in Uncertain Times” will come out simultaneously in 14 languages and 27 countries, with additional rights deals expected.

“In ‘The Light We Carry,’ Mrs. Obama offers readers a series of fresh stories and insightful reflections on change, challenge, and power, including her belief that when we light up for others, we can illuminate the richness and potential of the world around us, discovering deeper truths and new pathways for progress,” the publisher’s announcement reads in part.

“Drawing from her experiences as a mother, daughter, spouse, friend, and First Lady, she shares the habits and principles she has developed to successfully adapt to change and overcome various obstacles — the earned wisdom that helps her continue to ‘become.’”

On Thursday, Penguin Random House announced it was renaming an annual writing prize in her honor, the $10,000 Michelle Obama Award for Memoir, part of an awards program for public high school students the company launched in 1993.

Since completing “Becoming,” Michelle Obama has written an edition for younger readers and launched a podcast. With Barack Obama and their production company Higher Ground she has worked on such projects as the Oscar-winning documentary “American Factory” and a documentary about her tour for “Becoming,” when she appeared at arenas nationwide with such guest interviewers as Oprah Winfrey and Sarah Jessica Parker. Promotional plans for “The Light We Carry” will be announced later.

Crown is also the longtime publisher of Barack Obama, himself a million-selling author. “A Promised Land,” the first of two planned memoirs about his presidency, came out in 2020. A spokesperson declined to comment on when the next book will be released.

And with that, the nation’s first female and first Black vice president announced the confirmation of the first Black woman to the Supreme Court. Ketanji Brown Jackson will join the high court following Justice Stephen Breyer’s retirement this summer.

Cheers broke out in the Senate chamber. At the White House, Jackson and President Joe Biden embraced.

Reaction to Jackson’s confirmation was jubilant from many corners, and the word “historic” was repeated again and again. Others, including Republican lawmakers who voted overwhelmingly against her, kept up their criticism of her record, calling her an activist judge.

At Howard University’s law school, students watching the vote live on television listened raptly from a conference room of Houston Hall, the main academic building. The students at the historically Black school broke into applause when the vote was announced by Harris, who attended Howard as an undergraduate and is also the first person of South Asian descent to be vice president.

“We have a dark-skinned, Black woman on the Supreme Court with locks and she’s going to be looking for clerks,” said first year student Jasmine Marchbanks-Owens, 27, referring to the young lawyers who spend a year helping Supreme Court justices with their work.

Former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama were among those celebrating. “Like so many of you, I can’t help but feel a sense of pride — a sense of joy — to know that this deserving, accomplished Black woman will be a part of the highest court in the land,” the former first lady wrote on Twitter.

“This is a great day for America, and a proud moment in our history,” her husband wrote.

Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy, the Senate’s no. 2 Democrat, said in a statement it was “History indeed. And long overdue.” New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, one of only three Black senators and an exuberant supporter of Jackson’s during her confirmation hearing, said in a video message on Twitter: “Today is a mountain of joy. Today is a day for celebration. Today I rejoice. I cry tears of joy.”

District of Columbia Mayor Muriel Bowser, the city’s second Black woman to be mayor, called it “a day filled with great hope for the future of our country.”

Lawmakers weren’t the only ones cheering. Martin Luther King III, the eldest son of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., tweeted his congratulations, writing that Jackson’s nomination was “a long time coming.”

“I know there are millions of young girls, like my daughter, who are looking at this moment,” he wrote.

Martín Sabelli, the president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, said Jackson also brings a diversity of experience to the court. She will be the first justice since Thurgood Marshall, the legendary civil rights lawyer who was the first Black person on the court, with significant criminal defense work on her resume. Sabelli is hoping to see even more perspective from “in the trenches” state defense attorneys reflected in the judiciary.

At Harvard, Jackson’s alma mater, law students watched the final vote take place. Historically Black schools also celebrated.

“As a proud ‘girl dad,’ I couldn’t be more thrilled to have the opportunity to explain to my two young daughters what this historic moment means to the African American community. Yet another glass ceiling has been permanently shattered on a national level. Representation does matter,” Jackson State University President Thomas K. Hudson wrote to students, faculty and staff at the historically Black school in Mississippi.

Only three Republicans in the evenly divided Senate voted to confirm Jackson: Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Mitt Romney of Utah.

In a statement after the vote, Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel called Jackson “a radical, activist judge” who is in “lockstep with the far left’s political agenda.” She vowed that Republicans would “hold Democrats accountable this November for supporting Biden’s radical pick.”

At Howard University, the celebration didn’t last long. There was studying to do. Still, Benjamin Baker, 27, of Sylacauga, Alabama, called Jackson’s confirmation “monumental” and said it was for all the Black women who had come before her. “This is for them and for all of the Black women that will come after her,” he said.

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Crowd, Cheers, History as Senate Confirms 1st Black Woman to US Supreme Court

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Associated Press writers Mary Clare Jalonick and Zeke Miller in Washington, Aaron Morrison in New York City, Janet McConnaughey in New Orleans and Lindsay Whitehurst in Salt Lake City contributed to this report.

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At the time, Penn had just spent 18 months campaigning for then-Senator Barack Obama leading up to the 2008 presidential election. When it came time for the Obama-Biden administration to staff up, Penn didn’t set himself up to go after a job with the White House, even though he really wanted it.

Rather than express his interest with anyone he worked with on the campaign trail, he decided to fill out an application online and see if he’d get a callback from a hiring manager.

“I’m thinking, ‘well, I guess if I apply on change.gov, and if I’m actually qualified to work at the White House, then somebody will find that and they’ll call me,” Penn told Hello Monday. He was hesitant to leverage his connections to avoid the stereotype of being an entitled actor: “And so I filled out this very detailed form on change.gov, and hit submit.”

Then, “nobody called.”

While he waited, Penn felt as though he wasn’t cut out for the job, even though working for the Obama campaign really inspired and motivated him, and he knew he played a part in its success. Then he heard of former campaign peers landing positions after applying online but also flagging their application to senior advisors with the transition team.

Still, it wasn’t Penn’s own self-advocacy that eventually landed him in the White House.

Instead, months later, Penn was invited to an inaugural event and brought along his Hollywood agent, Dan, as a guest — the only person he’d told about applying to the White House in the off chance he’d have to take a break from acting.

As Penn recalled, he got into a polite exchange with Michelle Obama, who thanked him for his work on the campaign and encouraged him to keep in touch, at which point Dan “just blurts out, well, you know, Mrs. Obama, he applied for a job.”

“My face turned red,” Penn continued, “and I looked at him and I was like, ‘no, this is not the time to do that.’ And she goes, ‘What do you mean, you applied for a job? And he goes, ‘Well, you’re telling him to stay in touch and help out …. He applied on the website for a White House job.'”

While he can laugh about it now, Penn described Michelle Obama’s reaction as “this look that unmistakably said, ‘Are you really that stupid?'”

She then invited Barack Obama to join the conversation, who was also confused and poked fun that Penn would apply to the White House online but not pass along his interest to former campaign colleagues who could serve as references.

“That was the first time that clicked with me, where I thought I was doing the right thing and not shaking things up and keeping my head down,” Penn told Hello Monday. In reality, Penn now sees that his lack of self-advocacy might have been perceived as a lack of interest in the job itself.

The big lesson for everyone, Penn said, is “you do need to advocate for yourself and let people know” what you want.

Given the time he already put in with the Obama campaign, “if I was serious about it, I should have made it known in a serious, professional way,” Penn said. Thankfully, Penn’s conversation with the Obamas, with Dan’s help, opened a discussion about him finding a role in the administration.

By April 2009, Penn went on to serve in the Obama administration as the principal associate editor in the White House Office of Public Engagement. He became a co-chair of Obama’s reelection campaign and in 2013 was appointed to serve on the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities.

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