I’ve been trying to connect a lot of dots in my pursuit of former President Barack Obama’s famous tan suit. But here’s the tricky part about connecting dots, even for me, an experienced journalist: First, you’ve got to find them.
Let me explain.
I’m on the hunt for the tan suit Obama wore to a White House press conference in 2014 — the one that sparked attacks from right-wing critics eager to diminish the nation’s first Black president. The suit is not in the recently opened museum at the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park; reporters were told Obama gave it away years ago after cleaning out his closet.
If you saw the former president wearing a tan suit when he played himself opposite Larry David in the August finale of HBO’s “Life, Larry and the Pursuit of Unhappiness” in a spoof about that press conference — well, it’s a look-alike, not the original.
The entire saga sparked questions about race, culture, what’s news and, yes, presidential fashion. Questions as relevant in 2026 as they were in 2014. Questions I am asking as part of my search for the tan suit — and the conversations I hope to be having with you.
Recently, I was talking about my pursuit with Tavis Smiley, the host of a nationally syndicated talk show aimed at Black audiences. And I’m grateful to Smiley for offering up a generous serving of dots when I was a guest on his Aug. 19 show.
During the segment, I mentioned the anniversary of the tan suit press conference is Aug. 28.
“You know what else happened on Aug. 28?” he asked. “Think about it.”
I was stumped.
“Being a history buff, my mind went to that same date,” Smiley said. “Here’s what else happened on Aug. 28.”
On Aug. 28, 1955, Emmett Till, a 14-year-old Black youth from Chicago’s South Side, was kidnapped and savagely murdered by two white supremacists in Mississippi. Till’s mutilated body was pulled from the Tallahatchie River on Aug. 31, 1955, with barbed wire tied around his neck and attached to a cotton gin fan weighing 70 pounds.
Till’s killing was a defining moment in civil rights history due to a key decision by his mother, Mamie Till-Mobley. She insisted on an open casket for her son’s funeral at the Roberts Temple Church of God in Christ, 4021 S. State St., so the world could see his mutilated body and witness the results of race-based violence.
On Aug. 28, 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech. Standing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, King called for racial justice.
“Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality to all of God’s children. … I have a dream that one day, even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.”
On Aug. 28, 2008, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., accepted the Democratic nomination for president. Obama delivered his acceptance speech at Denver’s Invesco Field, home of the NFL’s Broncos. His words take on special meaning today: This summer, the nation marks its 250th anniversary as President Donald Trump dismantles racial equity gains and ends racial justice programs and policies.
Obama noted in Denver that he was speaking at the nation’s 232nd anniversary and “at each moment when that promise was in jeopardy, ordinary men and women, students and soldiers, farmers and teachers, nurses and janitors, found the courage to keep it alive.”
“We meet at one of those defining moments,” he continued. “A moment when our nation is at war, our economy is in turmoil and the American promise has been threatened once more. That’s the promise of America — the idea that we are responsible for ourselves, but that we also rise or fall as one nation; the fundamental belief that I am my brother’s keeper; I am my sister’s keeper.”
And on Aug. 28, 2014, Obama wore that tan suit to a press conference to discuss the economy, war and global crises, with the takeaway being his choice of clothing. That press conference prompted questions about whether race was a factor in the overheated outrage over the summer suit worn by the first Black president.
See how these Aug. 28 threads weave together?
The Obama Presidential Foundation is leaning into the tan suit. Last week, it posted on social media, “We heard Tan Suit Day is coming up… Show us your tan suit.” It’s a callout for folks to share their “favorite tan suit look” on social media.
I didn’t know Tan Suit Day was a thing.
Now I do.
I’ve got another dot.