Barack Obama Told Ex, ‘I Make Love to Men Daily, But in the Imagination,’ Letter Shows
By Jon Levine
Former President Barack Obama wrote of his own “androgynous” mind and “mak[ing] love to men daily, but in the imagination,” according to the redacted portion of a now-notorious 1982 letter, obtained by The Post.
The more than 40-year-old letter to an ex-girlfriend recently resurfaced after Obama biographer David Garrow gave a long and winding interview on the one-time commander-in-chief.
“In regard to homosexuality, I must say that I believe this is an attempt to remove oneself from the present, a refusal perhaps to perpetuate the endless farce of earthly life. You see, I make love to men daily, but in the imagination,” Obama, then 21, wrote to Alex McNear in November 1982.
A 21-year-old Barack Obama said he imagined making love to men in his head, according to one of his old letters
“I make love to men daily, but in the imagination,” Barack Obama wrote in a 1982 letter to an ex-girlfriend
“My mind is androgynous to a great extent and I hope to make it more so until I can think in terms of people, not women as opposed to men. But, in returning to the body, I see that I have been made a man, and physically in life, I choose to accept that contingency,” he added.
McNear, who dated Obama during his year at Occidental College in Los Angeles, later redacted the salacious paragraphs, which Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Garrow hunted down and included in his tome “Rising Star.”
The letter is currently owned by Emory University, which doesn’t permit it to be photographed or removed. Instead, Garrow’s friend Harvey Klehr transcribed the paragraphs by hand and sent them to the author.
The letter to former girlfriend Alex McNear is owned by Emory University.
Obama has been married to Michelle Obama since 1992.
Klehr provided the redacted portion of the letter to The Post.
Obama, a father of two, has been married to his wife, Michelle, since 1992.
Garrow said there was nothing unusual about Obama’s youthful musings.
“I’m a historian, not a psychologist, but I think it’s ‘public record’ news that a (vast?) majority of human beings have sexual fantasies!” he said via email.
A rep for the former president did not respond to a request for comment.
