President Obama To Engage Young European Leaders at Town Hall in Berlin

March 19, 2019 at 8:00 AM CDT

CHICAGO—Today, the Obama Foundation announced that President Barack Obama will speak at a town hall with emerging leaders from across Europe in Berlin, Germany, on April 6, 2019.

The town hall reflects the Obama Foundation’s efforts to engage young leaders from around the world in a conversation about the importance of community leadership and civic engagement, consistent with the Foundation’s mission to inspire, empower, and connect people to change their world. The Foundation has launched several civic engagement programs that support young leaders globally, including Obama Foundation Scholars, Obama Foundation Leaders: Africa and Leaders: Asia-Pacific, and Obama Foundation Fellows. In addition, the Foundation has hosted roundtables, town halls, and workshops with President Obama in Germany, Indonesia, Brazil, India, Singapore, New Zealand, the Netherlands, and Hawaiʻi to help inform the Foundation’s global programming.

"President Obama and the Foundation want to hear directly from emerging leaders from across Europe—about their aspirations, challenges, and issues of concern and opportunity," said Bernadette Meehan, Chief International Officer at the Obama Foundation. "The future of Europe lies with these young leaders, and the Foundation wants to help them advance and scale their work. We look forward to hearing how the Foundation can best support these young leaders, who already are doing inspiring work to advance positive change, hand in hand with their communities."

The town hall will include some 300 young leaders from across the continent who are working in areas such as government, civil society, journalism, transparency, food security, entrepreneurship, anti-discrimination, integration issues, and technology. They are drawn from public, private, and nonprofit sectors and come from a cross-section of backgrounds. During the town hall, President Obama will answer questions from young leaders in the room and also answer questions submitted online by young people across Europe. Young people in Europe are invited to submit a question at obama.org.

The town hall will be livestreamed on obama.org on Saturday, April 6, 2019. More details will be available on obama.org closer to the event date.

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Contact:

Laura Lucas Magnuson, Obama Foundation, llucasmagnuson@obama.org