This is the second of a series of articles WND has developed from months of confidential in-person interviews with members of

Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago who have known Barack and Michelle Obama on a personal basis over many

years.  In the first story , members of the church claimed Barack Obama benefited from Wright’s “Down Low Club,” part of a

documented underground subculture in which black men who engage in homosexual activity marry to maintain respectability in

public. Because of the personal risk the sources perceived they were taking to speak candidly about the president and his family,

their identities have been masked.

As a young single woman, Michelle Robinson was a fixture in the home of civil rights leader Jesse Jackson, who along with Rev.

Jeremiah Wright “arranged” her marriage to Barack Obama, according to sources in Chicago who know the couple.

“If you want to understand Michelle Obama, you’ve got to go back to Jesse Jackson,” a woman called

“Robyn” for this article told WND.

Robyn, who spent several years working for Jackson’s Rainbow PUSH Coalition, explained to a WND

investigator in Chicago that Michelle Obama “just about grew up in Jesse Jackson’s home.”

“Jesse should have charged her rent and board for the amount of time she spent in his home instead of

her own,” she said. Jackson’s daughter, Santita, is still one of Michelle’s best friends. Santita and Jesse

Jr. call her “sis,”  short for “sister.”

Santita Jackson said in an interview just before Obama took office in 2008 that she has known Michelle  Obama since they car-pooled together as high school classmates. Santita was maid of honor at Michelle and Barack Obama’s wedding, and she is the godmother to the Obama’s older daughter, Malia.

Robyn also pointed out Jesse Jackson Jr., a Democratic Party member of the U.S. House from Illinois,  served as the national co-chairman of Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign.

“It all relates back to Trinity and to the Jesse Jackson orbit of blacks here in Chicago who gave Obama

legitimacy and helped him establish his identity as a black man,” Robyn explained.

“The political left wanted to push a black to the presidency, and the key operatives in the Democratic  Party decided long ago it wouldn’t be Jesse Jackson (Sr.). Then Jesse wanted it to be his son, but Jesse Jr. has serious drug and mental problems that the world knows about now. These were also known about in the past, and Jesse Jr. was never going to be the black president. So, the political left then chose Obama.”

In an  interview with the Chicago Sun-Times in August , Sandi Jackson admitted her husband, Jesse Jr.,  was “completely debilitated by depression,” which has forced him to put his Washington home for sale to pay his medical bills, including his treatment at the Mayo Clinic. He has been absent from Congress since mid-June, putting his House seat at risk in the November election .

They met where?

Obama’s retelling of an event most spouses remember precisely for the rest of their lives has caused  confusion. Exactly when and how did he first meet Michelle Robinson?

Before  a speech at the New Economic School graduation in Moscow on July 7, 2009 , Obama stated he  first met Michelle in school.

“I don’t know if anybody else will meet their future wife or husband in class like I did, but I’m sure  you’re all going to have wonderful careers,” he said, according to Newsweek .

The problem is that Michelle Obama earned her degree from Harvard Law School in 1988, and Obama  did not arrive at Harvard Law School until that fall, graduating three years later in 1991.

The commonly accepted story is that they first met in Chicago in 1989, when Barack took a summer job  as an intern at the Chicago law firm Sidley Austin, and Michelle, who was employed as a lawyer at the firm, was assigned to be his mentor.

WND has reported Allen Hulton, the U.S. postal carrier who delivered mail to the parents of Weather  Underground bomber Bill Ayers in a Chicago suburb, met Obama in the summer of 1989, while Obama was an intern at Sidley Austin.

In 1991, during their engagement to be married, top Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett, then serving as the deputy chief of staff to Mayor Richard M. Daley, hired Michelle to a job in the mayor’s office.

“Michelle hated working for the city even more than she hated working at Sidley Austin,” Robyn told WND.

“At the law firm, she lasted so short of a time because they expected her to do work,” Robyn said. “At the City of Chicago, where she worked under Mayor Daley, Michelle had one of those ‘Jesse hires’ positions. These are patronage jobs where the recipients did nothing.”

Robyn claimed that while working for Daley, Michelle just collected a check, doing very little work.

“She sat at a desk and read the newspaper all day,” Robyn said. “Sometimes she read romance novel paperbacks. No one could say anything to her because she was a ‘Jesse hire.’ This meant if anyone did complain about her not working that Jesse Jackson would get mad at Daley over that, and there would be trouble.”

Robyn said Michelle was “essentially treated like she was Jesse’s daughter, and Michelle’s connections in Chicago were a key to Obama’s rise to power.”

Connections

Political connections played throughout Michelle’s young life in Chicago.

Her father, Fraser C. Robinson III, who was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in his 20s and eventually walked with the use of crutches, was a volunteer Democratic precinct captain in addition to his job in the boiler room at Chicago’s water purification plant.

As Democratic precinct captain, Robinson had power and influence, given his access to “street money” the Daley machine freely handed out at that time in Chicago’s South Side to make sure black voters turned out to vote for Democratic Party machine candidates.

The Chicago sources told WND the selection of Michelle Robinson for Obama was made by Jesse Jackson, and Jeremiah Wright agreed it would be a good combination.

“It all relates back to Trinity United and to the Jesse Jackson orbit of blacks here in Chicago who gave Obama legitimacy and helped him establish his identity as a black man ‘from Chicago,’” Robyn explained.

“Michelle came from a political family; she was intelligent even if she didn’t really like to work. Wright knew Obama was gay, but he needed the cover of a wife if he were to succeed in politics.”

A current member of Trinity church who has known the Obamas for 20 years, “Carolyn,” confirmed Trinity “helped a lot of blacks get successful and connected.”

“That’s what Wright did for Obama,” she claimed. “He connected Obama in the community, and he helped Obama hide his homosexuality.”

According to Robyn, Jackson explained to Michelle that she would live a life of luxury once Obama was president, and that she never again would have to worry about money.

“Michelle was nasty, and most straight guys would never be able to put up with her moods and temperament,” Robyn maintained. “But Obama really didn’t care. Michelle had the credentials and she looked the part. Obama wasn’t interested in her for sex.”

A source WND will identify as Hazel, a long-term member of the Trinity congregation, insisted Obama remained sexually involved with men after his marriage to Michelle.

“I remember being at this function at Reverend Wright’s house, one of the many parties Wright had, in 1996,” Hazel recalled.

“I went to the room where all the coats were on the bed, because I wanted to leave. I was surprised to find the light in the room was off and the coats were on the floor,” she said. “Then I realized there were two men hugging and kissing in there. One of those men was Obama. This was long before anybody knew Obama, before he became famous like he is today.”

Hazel has been telling this story in Chicago since 1996.

Cushy job

When Jarrett left Mayor Daley’s office to head Chicago’s Department of Planning and Development, she took Michelle with her.  Jarrett later became the chairwoman of the Chicago Medical Center, and Michelle again got “a cushy job at the Chicago Medical Center with a salary of $317,000,” as reported by Edward Klein on page 117 of his 2012 book “The Amateur: Barack Obama in the White House.”

New York Times reporter Jodi Kantor wrote in 2008 that Jarrett would have to be at the top of a list of people who helped Barack  and Michelle Obama.

“Nearly two decades ago, Ms. Jarrett swept the young lawyers under her wing, introduced them to a wealthier and better-connected  Chicago than their own, and eventually secured contacts and money essential to Mr. Obama’s long-shot Senate victory,” Kantor wrote.

Klein,  in an interview with Fox News , described Jarrett as the “de facto” president of the United States, “the best friend of the first  lady and soul mate of the president.”

Santita Jackson said in an interview just before Obama took office in 2008 that she has known Michelle Obama since they car-pooled together as high school classmates. Santita was maid of honor at Michelle and Barack Obama’s wedding, and she is the godmother to the Obama’s older daughter, Malia.

Robyn also pointed out Jesse Jackson Jr., a Democratic Party member of the U.S. House from Illinois, served as the national co-chairman of Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign.

“It all relates back to Trinity and to the Jesse Jackson orbit of blacks here in Chicago who gave Obama legitimacy and helped him establish his identity as a black man,” Robyn explained.

“The political left wanted to push a black to the presidency, and the key operatives in the Democratic Party decided long ago it wouldn’t be Jesse Jackson (Sr.). Then Jesse wanted it to be his son, but Jesse Jr. has serious drug and mental problems that the world knows about now. These were also known about in the past, and Jesse Jr. was never going to be the black president. So, the political left then chose Obama.”