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Departing Obama Speechwriter: 'I Leave This Job Actually More Hopeful'

Behind most politicians is a speechwriter, typing rapidly somewhere in a small office and trying to channel the boss's voice.

The man who has held perhaps the most prominent speechwriting job of the new millennium is Jon Favreau, a 31-year-old from Massachusetts who was President Obama's chief speechwriter until this month. He started writing for Obama when the president was just a senator in 2005.

He tells Audie Cornish, host of All Things Considered , that writing for the president means walking a line between two worlds.

"You're trying to balance what the president would want to say with what people are looking to hear," he says. "But you need to strike the right balance, because if it's all what people want to hear, that's not true to who he is."

Jon Favreau, President Obama's former chief speechwriter, is pictured on the South Lawn of the White House in 2010. Charles Dharapak/AP hide caption

Favreau says his next stop after the White House is starting a communications consulting firm; he plans to write a screenplay based on his experiences.

"We'll see how long it takes for me to find my own voice again," he says.

Interview Highlights

On the writing process

"My challenge is to make sure that whatever he's thinking, whatever thoughts he has, we can get them down on paper, and we can shape the words to basically what he really wants to say. So our process is, I will sit down with him, we'll talk for 20 or 30 minutes, and he'll have lots of thoughts on the specific speech that he's going to give. And then I will go back, and I'll work with my team, and we will put together a draft that reflects the conversation that the president and I had.

"And then we'll start going back and forth. Sometimes he will just make line edits himself and send the draft back. Or sometimes he will want to take the speech in an entirely different direction, and he will write six or seven pages of scrawled handwriting on a yellow legal pad, and we'll go back at it that way."

On the editing process

"There have been times where I'll have a phrase in there and he'll take it out — and then I'll explain to him, 'Well, I put it in here because if we do it this way, maybe it'll be a sound bite or maybe we'll get a quote that way or, rhythmic-wise, it'll be better.' And ... once in a while he'll say, 'Oh, I think you're right, let's do it this way.' And sometimes he'll say, 'No, I think the way I had it was better.' And that's just how we work. We have a very honest relationship."

On collaborating on Obama's famous race speech

"When I talk about the speech, I always say, you know, the stuff in the speech that you could hear almost any other politician say is mostly the stuff that I contributed. ... Before he gave it, he called me after a long day of campaigning, and he spoke for an hour about what he wanted in that speech. He told me it was going to be random thoughts off the top of his head, and they were not random at all. He had the entire logical argument all ready. ... He laid out the whole thing."

On his departing thoughts

"I leave this job actually more hopeful than when I first got there, and that is because I think that the president went into this more realistically than many people thought that he did. I've been working on these speeches since 2005, and so I know that almost every speech, he makes sure we have the caveat that, 'This is going to be hard.' ... He's not mistaken about how difficult some of this stuff is."

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Early Life and Education

Early political career, presidential campaign, white house, accolades and personal life.

John Favreau was born on June 2, 1981, in Winchester, Massachusetts, to a family of French descent that settled in Pennsylvania in 1856. He spent his early years in North Reading, Massachusetts, and graduated in 2003 from the College of the Holy Cross, a Catholic liberal arts college, with a degree in political science.

At Holy Cross, Favreau was elected treasurer and chairman of the local Democratic debate committee, studied piano, and was deeply involved in social service programs, eventually leading the campus's Welfare Solidarity Project from 1999 to 2000. Additionally, he worked for Habitat for Humanity and a cancer support program at the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 2001, and in 2002, he launched a project to help unemployed individuals improve their resumes and interviewing skills.

Favreau's accolades throughout college included the Harry S. Truman Scholarship in 2002. He was also an editor for the school newspaper and worked as an intern in John Kerry's office during summers. Notably, Favreau has expressed a fear of flying, despite his frequent need to travel for his career.

In 2004, the recent college graduate joined the presidential campaign of Senator John Kerry, and when the campaign suddenly lost its speechwriter, Favreau filled the role. However, after Kerry's defeat in the election, Favreau's confidence was shaken, and he was uncertain if he wanted to continue pursuing politics.

Favreau met Barack Obama later that year at the Democratic National Convention, when Obama, then an Illinois state senator running for the United States Senate, was rehearsing his speech backstage. Favreau, then only 23, interrupted the future president's rehearsal and convinced him that the speech needed to be rewritten. In 2005, Favreau began working for the newly elected senator, and by 2007, he had become his chief speechwriter, leading a team that also included Adam Frankel and Ben Rhodes.

During the presidential campaign, Favreau worked tirelessly. His management style differed from that of other speechwriters, as he forwent an official office. Favreau and his team often met with the president in a small conference room, working until late in the evening over takeout food. According to colleagues, Favreau had the president's ultimate trust.

Favreau has cited the speeches of Robert Kennedy and Michael Gerson as major influences on his writing, and he has also expressed admiration for the speeches of Peggy Noonan. Gerson, a renowned speechwriter and advisor to the previous president, was so impressed with Favreau's work that he sought him out at an Obama campaign rally to talk to the younger writer.

When President Obama settled into the White House in 2009, Favreau was appointed Deputy Assistant to the President and Chief Speechwriter. He became the second-youngest White House Chief Speechwriter after James Fallows. Favreau currently earns an annual salary of $172,200.

Time magazine named Favreau one of the 100 most influential people in the world. He has also been ranked 33rd in Washington, D.C.'s 50 most influential individuals and has regularly appeared on lists of the world's most eligible bachelors. Favreau previously dated actress Rashida Jones, who also worked on the Kerry and Obama campaigns, but they are no longer together.

Despite his apparent success in speechwriting, Favreau hopes that his work with the Obama administration will be his last in politics, stating that he finds it to be mentally exhausting.

© BIOGRAPHS

Jon Favreau (speechwriter)

Jonathan Edward Favreau [1] ( / ˈ f æ v r oʊ / ; born June 2, 1981) [2] is an American progressive political commentator, podcaster, and the former director of speechwriting for President Barack Obama . [3] [4] [5]

Early life and education

Political career, kerry campaign, obama campaign, white house director of speechwriting (2009–2013), after the white house, controversies, personal life, external links.

After graduating from the College of the Holy Cross as valedictorian, [6] Favreau worked for the John Kerry presidential campaign in 2004, working to collect talk radio news for the campaign and was promoted to the role of Deputy Speechwriter. [7] Favreau first met Barack Obama, then a state senator from Illinois, while working on the Kerry campaign.

In 2005, Obama's communications director Robert Gibbs recommended Favreau to Obama as a speechwriter. [8] Favreau was hired as Obama's speechwriter shortly after Obama's election to the United States Senate . Obama and Favreau grew close, and Obama referred to him as his "mind reader". He went on the campaign trail with Obama during his successful presidential election campaign . In 2009, he was named to the White House staff as Director of Speechwriting. [9]

After starting the well received and Grassroots podcast “Keeping it 1600” via “The Ringer” media group in March of 2017, he co-founded liberal media company Crooked Media with fellow former Obama staffers Tommy Vietor and Jon Lovett , and began co-hosting the political podcast Pod Save America with Vietor, Lovett, and Dan Pfeiffer . [10]

Favreau was born at Winchester Hospital and raised in nearby North Reading, Massachusetts , [2] [11] the son of Lillian ( née DeMarkis), a schoolteacher, and Mark Favreau. His father is of French Canadian descent and his mother is of Greek descent . [12] His grandfather, Robert Favreau, was a member of the New Hampshire House of Representatives and described by Favreau as a " New England Republican ." [13] [14] Favreau graduated from the Jesuit College of the Holy Cross in 2003 as his class's valedictorian , [15] [16] with a degree in political science . [17]

At Holy Cross, he was treasurer and debate committee chairman for the College Democrats , and studied classical piano. [15] From 1999 to 2000, he served on the Welfare Solidarity Project, eventually becoming its director. In 2001, Favreau worked with Habitat for Humanity and a University of Massachusetts Amherst program to bring visitors to cancer patients.

In 2002, he became head of an initiative to help unemployed individuals improve their résumés and interview skills. He also earned a variety of honors in college, including the Vanicelli Award; being named the 2001 Charles A. Dana Scholar; memberships in the Political Science Honor Society, Pi Sigma Alpha , the College Honors Program, the Sociology Honor Society, Alpha Kappa Delta , and was awarded a Harry S. Truman Scholarship in 2002. [15] He was an editor on his college newspaper, and during summers in college, he earned extra income selling newspapers as a telemarketer, while also interning in John Kerry's offices. [18]

He joined Senator John Kerry 's 2004 presidential campaign soon after graduation from the College of the Holy Cross. [3] While working for the Kerry campaign, his job was to assemble audio clips of talk radio programs for the Kerry camp to review for the next day. When the Kerry campaign began to falter at one point, they found themselves without a speechwriter, and Favreau was promoted to the role of deputy speechwriter. Following Kerry's defeat, Favreau became dispirited with politics, and was uncertain if he would do such work again. [16] Favreau first met Obama (then an Illinois State Senator running for the U.S. Senate), while still working for Kerry, backstage at the 2004 Democratic National Convention as Obama was rehearsing his keynote address . Favreau, then 23 years old, interrupted Obama's rehearsal, advising the soon-to-be-elected Senator that a rewrite was needed because Kerry wanted to use one of the lines. [18]

Obama communications aide Robert Gibbs , who had worked for Kerry's campaign, recommended Favreau to Obama as an excellent writer, and in 2005 he began working for Barack Obama in his U.S. Senate office before joining his presidential campaign as chief speechwriter in 2006. [19] His interview with Obama was on the Senator's first day. Uninterested in Favreau's résumé, Obama instead questioned Favreau on what motivated him to work in politics and his theory of writing. [16] He described this theory to Obama as, "A speech can broaden the circle of people who care about this stuff. How do you say to the average person that's been hurting: 'I hear you, I'm there?' Even though you've been so disappointed and cynical about politics in the past, and with good reason, we can move in the right direction. Just give me a chance." [20]

Favreau led a speechwriting team for the campaign that included Ben Rhodes and Cody Keenan . [18] For his work with Obama in the campaign, he would wake as early as 5   a.m., and routinely stayed up until 3 a.m. working on speeches. [18] His leadership style among other Obama speechwriters was very informal. They would often meet in a small conference room, discussing their work late into the evening over takeout food. According to Rhodes, Favreau did not drive structured meetings with agendas. "If he had, we probably would have laughed at him," Rhodes said. Favreau was planning to hire more speechwriters to assist him, but conceded he was unsure of how to manage them. According to him, "My biggest strength isn't the organization thing." [20]

He has likened his position to " Ted Williams ' batting coach", because of Obama's celebrated abilities as a speaker and writer. Obama senior adviser David Axelrod said of Favreau, "Barack trusts him... And Barack doesn't trust too many folks with that—the notion of surrendering that much authority over his own words." [18] In Obama's own words, Favreau was his "mind reader". [21] He and Obama share a fierce sports rivalry between the Boston Red Sox , favored by Favreau, and the Chicago White Sox , favored by Obama. [2] When the White Sox defeated the Red Sox 3–0 in the 2005 American League playoffs , Obama swept off Favreau's desk with a small broom. [18] During the campaigns, he was obsessed with election tracking polls, jokingly referring to them as his "daily crack". At points during the campaign, he felt overwhelmed by his responsibilities and would turn to Axelrod and his friends for advice. [20]

Favreau has declared that the speeches of Robert F. Kennedy and Michael Gerson have influenced his work, [22] and has expressed admiration for Peggy Noonan 's speechwriting, citing a talk given by Ronald Reagan at Pointe du Hoc as his favorite Noonan speech. Gerson also admires Favreau's work, and sought him out at an Obama New Hampshire campaign rally to speak with the younger speechwriter. [23] Favreau was the primary writer of Obama's inauguration address of January 2009. The Guardian describes the process as follows:

"The inaugural speech has shuttled between them [Obama and Favreau] four or five times, following an initial hour-long meeting in which the President-elect spoke about his vision for the address, and Favreau took notes on his computer. Favreau then went away and spent weeks on research. His team interviewed historians and speechwriters, studied periods of crisis, and listened to past inaugural orations. When ready, he took up residence in a Starbucks in Washington and wrote the first draft." [21]

When President Obama assumed office in 2009, Favreau was appointed Assistant to the President and Director of Speechwriting. [3] He became the second-youngest chief White House speechwriter on record, after James Fallows . [19] His salary was $172,200 a year. [24]

Favreau has said his work with Obama will be his final job in the realm of politics, saying, "Anything else would be anticlimactic." [25] In regard to his post-political future, he said, "Maybe I'll write a screenplay, or maybe a fiction book based loosely on what all of this was like. You had a bunch of kids working on this campaign together, and it was such a mix of the serious and momentous and just the silly ways that we are. For people in my generation, it was an unbelievable way to grow up." [20]

In March 2013, Favreau left the White House, along with Tommy Vietor , to pursue a career in private sector consulting and screenwriting. [26] [22] Together, they founded the communications firm Fenway Strategies. From 2013 to 2016, Favreau wrote sporadically for the Daily Beast . [27] In 2016, after the November presidential election was won by Donald Trump , Favreau, Vietor and Jon Lovett founded Crooked Media . Favreau co-hosts Crooked's premier political podcast Pod Save America with Dan Pfeiffer , Vietor and Lovett. In the wake of the new Republican healthcare bill, the AHCA , he coined the term "Wealthcare".

He currently serves on the Board of Advisors of Let America Vote , a voting rights organization founded by fellow Crooked Media host Jason Kander . [28]

Favreau was named one of the "100 Most Influential People in the World" by Time magazine in 2009. [29] In the same year he was ranked 33rd in the GQ "50 Most Powerful in D.C." and featured in the Vanity Fair "Next Establishment" list. [30] [31] Favreau was one of several Obama administration members in the 2009 "World's Most Beautiful People" issue of People magazine. [32] Executive Producer for the podcast This Land , and was nominated for a 2021 Peabody Award .

On December 5, 2008, a picture of Favreau grabbing the breast of a cardboard cut-out of then-Senator Hillary Clinton was posted on Facebook. [33] Clinton had recently been announced as Obama's nominee for U.S. Secretary of State . [34] Favreau called Senator Clinton's staff to offer an apology. The senator's office responded by joking that "Senator Clinton is pleased to learn of Jon's obvious interest in the State Department, and is currently reviewing his application." [35] [36] [22]

In June 2010, the website FamousDC obtained a picture of Favreau along with Assistant White House Press Secretary Tommy Vietor, playing beer pong after taking off their shirts at a restaurant in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. [37] This event attracted criticism from the press because of its timing during the height of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill . [38] [39] [40]

He is the older brother of Andy Favreau, a professional TV and movie actor. [41] On May 23, 2014, Favreau was awarded an honorary Doctor of Public Service degree by his alma mater, Holy Cross, where he also gave the commencement address. [42] On June 17, 2017, Favreau married Emily Black, daughter of federal Judge Timothy Black , at her family's vacation home in Biddeford Pool , Maine . [43] Their son, Charlie, was born in August 2020. [44] [45] Jon and his wife have had their second son, Teddy, in December 2023. [46]

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• 1 2 3 Parker, Ashley (December 5, 2008). "The New Team – Jonathan Favreau" . The New York Times . Retrieved June 3, 2009 .
• 1 2 3 "President-Elect Barack Obama names two new White House staff members" . The Office of the President-Elect . Archived from the original on November 26, 2008 . Retrieved January 27, 2009 .
• ↑ d'Ancona, Matthew (December 6, 2012). "Jon Favreau has the world's best job" . GQ . Retrieved December 16, 2016 .
• ↑ Jaffe, Greg (July 24, 2016). "Washington Post: Which Obama speech is one for the history books?" . Concord Monitor . Retrieved January 29, 2019 .
• ↑ "Unseen but heard – Meet Obama's speechwriter" . Georgian Journal . January 18, 2013 . Retrieved January 29, 2019 .
• ↑ "Three lessons in storytelling" (PDF) . NIMD . Retrieved January 29, 2010 .
• ↑ Glenn, Cheryl (2011). The Harbrace Guide to Writing, Concise . Boston, MA: Cengage Learning. ISBN   9780495913993 .
• ↑ "The Complete Obama Speech Archive" . Archived from the original on May 18, 2010 . Retrieved July 18, 2010 .
• ↑ Rutenberg, Jim (March 20, 2017). "Opposition and a Shave: Former Obama Aides Counter Trump" . The New York Times . ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved March 22, 2017 .
• ↑ Jon Favreau [@jonfavs] (December 28, 2017). "Born in Winchester hospital, grew up in NR" ( Tweet ) – via Twitter .
• ↑ Marchese, John (December 28, 2009). "Obama's Ghost – Jon Favreau – Obama's Speechwriter" . Boston Magazine . Archived from the original on December 12, 2013 . Retrieved October 11, 2013 .
• ↑ "Obama speechwriter has deep New Hampshire roots" . New Hampshire Union Leader . January 24, 2012 . Retrieved May 18, 2019 .
• ↑ Johnson, Eric (November 12, 2016). "Full transcript: 'Keepin' It 1600' co-host Jon Favreau on Recode Media" . Vox . Retrieved May 18, 2019 . My grandfather was a Republican state rep in New Hampshire way back in the day.
• 1 2 3 Kittredge, Dan (March 28, 2003). "Favreau named valedictorian" . The Holy Cross Crusader. Archived from the original on January 30, 2009 . Retrieved January 27, 2009 .
• 1 2 3 Wolffe, Richard (January 6, 2008). "In His Candidate's Voice" . Newsweek . Archived from the original on June 7, 2008 . Retrieved January 27, 2009 .
• ↑ Walsh, Kenneth T. (February 23, 2009). "Jon Favreau: Obama's Mind Reader Prepares for Congressional Address" . U.S. News & World Report . Retrieved October 13, 2009 .
• 1 2 3 4 5 6 Parker, Ashley (January 20, 2008). "What Would Obama Say?" . The New York Times . Retrieved January 25, 2009 .
• 1 2 Fallows, James (December 18, 2008). "I am shocked to see a factual error in today's Washington Post!" . The Atlantic . Retrieved January 27, 2009 .
• 1 2 3 4 Saslow, Eli (December 18, 2008). "Helping to Write History" . The Washington Post . Retrieved February 2, 2009 .
• 1 2 Pilkington, Ed (January 20, 2009). "Obama inauguration: Words of history ... crafted by 27-year-old in Starbucks" . The Guardian . Retrieved January 27, 2009 .
• 1 2 3 Walker, Tim (February 6, 2013). "Jon Favreau: From White House to silver screen" . The Independent . Archived from the original on June 14, 2022 . Retrieved January 29, 2019 .
• ↑ Warren, Mark (December 3, 2008). "What Obama's 27-Year-Old Speechwriter Learned From George W. Bush" . Esquire . Retrieved January 31, 2009 .
• ↑ "2010 Annual Report to Congress on White House Staff" . The Obama White House . Retrieved September 23, 2010 – via National Archives .
• ↑ Philp, Catherine (January 19, 2009). "Profile: Barack Obama's speechwriter Jon Favreau" . The Times . London . Retrieved January 31, 2009 .
• ↑ Jan, Tracy (March 3, 2013). "Leaving West Wing to pursue Hollywood dream" . Boston Globe . Retrieved January 19, 2015 .
• ↑ "Jon Favreau profile" . The Daily Beast . April 22, 2016.
• ↑ "Advisors" . Let America Vote . Retrieved May 1, 2018 .
• ↑ "The 2009 TIME 100 – Scientists & Thinkers: Jon Favreau" . Time . April 30, 2009. Archived from the original on May 2, 2009 . Retrieved September 23, 2010 .
• ↑ Draper, Robert; Naddaf, Raha; Goldstein, Sarah; Hylton, Wil S.; Kirby, Mark; Veis, Greg; Newmyer, Tory (October 12, 2009). "The 50 Most Powerful in D.C." GQ . Archived from the original on June 10, 2015 . Retrieved September 23, 2010 .
• ↑ Pressman, Matt; Bitici, Val; Gaffney, Adrienne (October 8, 2009). "The Next Establishment 2009" . Vanity Fair . Retrieved September 23, 2010 .
• ↑ "100 Most Beautiful: Barack's Beauties" . People . May 11, 2009 . Retrieved September 23, 2010 .
• ↑ "Obama speechwriter Favreau learns the perils of Facebook" . CNN . December 6, 2008. Archived from the original on December 7, 2008 . Retrieved January 27, 2009 .
• ↑ Schor, Elana (December 1, 2008). "Barack Obama nominates Hillary Clinton to the state department – as it happened" . The Guardian . ISSN   0261-3077 . Retrieved December 5, 2019 .
• ↑ Schlesinger, Robert (December 12, 2008). "Barack Obama Speechwriter Jon Favreau, the Hillary Clinton "Grope" and Scenes From the Surveillance Republic" . U.S. News & World Report . Retrieved February 2, 2009 .
• ↑ Brown, Campbell (December 5, 2008). "Commentary: Clinton changes her tune on sexism" . CNN . Retrieved January 27, 2009 .
• ↑ Nolongerfamous (June 7, 2010). "WHITE HOUSE GONE WILD: Shirtless Favreau And Vietor's Sunday/Funday Beer Pong Match" . Famous DC . Retrieved December 31, 2010 .
• ↑ Harris, John; Cogan, Marin (June 10, 2010). "Are Obama staffers overexposed?" . Politico . Retrieved December 31, 2010 .
• ↑ "A straight shooter, who isn't afraid to occasionally reveal the White House's fratty side" . MSNBC . Archived from the original on December 31, 2010 . Retrieved December 31, 2010 .
• ↑ Gibson, John (June 9, 2010). "White House Parties As Gulf Coast Suffers" . New York Post . Retrieved December 31, 2010 .
• ↑ Davis, Noah (December 1, 2017). "Actor Andy Favreau on His Way-Famous Brother and New Show with Mindy Kaling" . Best Life . Retrieved November 7, 2022 .
• ↑ "2014 Commencement Address - Jon Favreau" . College of the Holy Cross . Archived from the original on May 27, 2014 . Retrieved May 26, 2014 .
• ↑ Price Olsen, Anna (July 4, 2017). "Jon Favreau's Summer Wedding in Maine" . Brides . Retrieved July 25, 2017 .
• ↑ Emily Favreau [@ebfavs] (March 14, 2020). "Social distancing for FOUR in our house! Baby boy Favs coming August 2020! 💙" . Retrieved November 7, 2022 – via Instagram .
• ↑ Jon Favreau [@jonfavs] (July 24, 2020). "Few Notes" ( Tweet ) . Retrieved November 7, 2022 – via Twitter .
• ↑ Pod Save America (August 17, 2023). Jen Psaki Reacts to Donald Trump's New Indictment and Ron DeSantis' Debate Strategy . YouTube .
• Jon Favreau collected news and commentary at The New York Times
• Jon Favreau's valedictory address at College of the Holy Cross
• Leaving West Wing to pursue Hollywood dream , Tracy Jan, The Boston Globe , March 3, 2013

About: Jon Favreau (speechwriter)

Jonathan Edward Favreau (/ˈfævroʊ/; born June 2, 1981) is an American political commentator, podcaster, and the former director of speechwriting for President Barack Obama. Favreau attended the College of the Holy Cross, where he took part in and/or directed numerous community and civic programs. He also accumulated numerous scholastic honors before graduating as valedictorian. After graduation, he went to work for the John Kerry presidential campaign in 2004, working to collect talk radio news for the campaign and was promoted to the role of Deputy Speechwriter. Favreau first met Barack Obama, then a state Senator from Illinois, while working on the Kerry campaign.

Jon Favreau has the world's best job

In his memoirs, the late Ted Sorensen, speech writer and close advisor to John F Kennedy, recalls that President Clinton's press secretary, Mike McCurry, once told him: "Everyone who comes to Washington wants to be you." What McCurry meant was that, decades after Sorensen had left the White House, new arrivals in the nation's capital still modelled themselves upon him, longing to be the young advisor close to an inspirational president, entrusted with the politically sacred task of turning his thoughts into words. Many have aspired to the role. But perhaps the most extraordinary example of those who have followed Sorensen's example is Jon Favreau, director of speech writing to Barack Obama - and not yet 30.

When the president makes his state visit to Britain later this month, he will deliver speeches prepared by Favreau and his team.

More broadly, as Obama strives to recover from the "shellacking" of his party in last year's midterms and prepares to seek a second term in November 2012, Favreau will be at the heart of his quest to find a language that connects with Middle America and persuades Joe Six-Pack that Obama deserves four more years in the White House.

The president has often declared his admiration for Ronald Reagan.

It is remarkable to reflect that Favreau was not even born when Reagan won the presidency. Obama himself is scarcely a senior citizen. But the wunderkind was only 15 when his future boss became a state senator in Illinois.

Favreau came of age in the high season of The West Wing , the show that did more than anything since JFK's Camelot to glamorise the life of the White House aide. For once, however, political reality has trumped political myth. When it comes to exhilaration, intellectual energy and sheer desirability, the life Favreau now leads surpasses even that led by the young guns Sam Seaborn and Josh Lyman in Martin Sheen's fictional Bartlet administration. Plucked by Obama from the life of a disillusioned DC drone - so hard up he lived off happy-hour deals in cheap Washington joints - Favreau now tours the world on Air Force One at the side of the world's most powerful man, laptop slung over his shoulder, making history as he goes. "Dude, what you're writing is going to be hung up in people's living rooms!" Bill Burton, Obama's campaign press chief, said to his young colleague as he tapped away at a draft of the inaugural address. Favreau was 27 at the time: only in show business and sport do the young experience so much pressure, power and glamour so early in life.

To understand the Obama presidency, one must understand Jon Favreau (not to be confused with his namesake, the Hollywood actor and Iron Man director). Tall, gap-toothed, recognisable by his Timberlake buzz cut, the 29-year-old is the man to whom the 44th president entrusts one of his most precious political assets: his oratory. George W Bush made hundreds of speeches, some of them very significant (the State of the Union address in 2002 that identified the "axis of evil", the West Point speech in the same year that unveiled the doctrine of pre-emptive attack). But nobody would pretend that the last president was a gifted rhetorician.

Obama, in contrast, rose to national prominence with a single speech - a tour de force delivered at the Democratic National Convention in 2004. The punctuation marks of the thrilling presidential primaries of 2007-8 were a series of Obama speeches that frequently mesmerised and rarely disappointed. As David Axelrod, chief strategist for his presidential campaign has observed: "Barack trusts [Favreau]. And Barack doesn't trust too many folks with that - the notion of surrendering that much authority over his own words."

Second, Favreau - or "Favs", as the president calls him - personified the brazen youthfulness of the Obama campaign. It sent an unambiguous message to the world that the Democrat nominee had hired a member of the Facebook generation to be his speech writer, rather than a seasoned political professional or freelancing academic. Favreau's method was that of the student having an essay crisis. He would withdraw with his laptop to a nearby Starbucks, take off his Aviator sunglasses and pound away for hours - a process he called "crashing". Even now, more soberly dressed and with a formal White House title, at the helm of a team of six writers, he sometimes disappears to a Washington coffee shop for peace, caffeine and concentration. This, it is safe to say, is not how Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton wrote speeches for George Washington - or, for that matter, Raymond Moley, FDR's legendary speech writer, or Peggy Noonan, when she prepared Ronald Reagan's homespun addresses.

As such, Favreau has always been an unofficial mascot of the Obama phenomenon, an important anchor of the brand. It was no accident that a host of profiles of the young prodigy appeared during Obama's campaign. It did the nominee's chances no harm for it to be known that, on the night of victory in the Iowa caucuses, Favs had e-mailed his friend: "Dude, we won. Oh my God." Such stories cemented the idea that Obama was the candidate for the digital era, not just the first African-American with a serious chance of winning, but the first candidate since Bobby Kennedy truly to understand the aspirations of the young.

That scrutiny came at a cost. At a party thrown for him by his parents at their home in North Reading, Massachusetts, Favreau was photographed with a cardboard effigy of Hillary Clinton, Obama's defeated rival for the Democratic nomination, apparently groping her breast. Inevitably, the picture ended up on Facebook - forcing Favreau to make a grovelling apology to the new secretary of state.

Since then, he has cultivated a markedly lower profile. The Brownlow Report in the Thirties, which first recommended professionally staffing the White House, advised presidential aides to display "a passion for anonymity". But Favreau has not gone quite that far. He still features routinely in video clips on the official White House website, usually when the presidential entourage is on tour overseas.

His love life is always of interest to the gossip columns and celebrity websites - not least when he was linked to Ali Campoverdi, a White House aide who had once posed in lingerie for

Maxim . Last June, he and fellow Obama staffer, Tommy Vietor, were photographed shirtless in a Georgetown bar, apparently playing "beer pong" (an endlessly variable beer-drenched version of table tennis, beloved of frat boys). Favreau and Vietor denied, via "friends", that they were playing the game. But that didn't stop conservative bloggers having a field day about these young pups supposedly dragging the presidency into disrepute.

Born in June 1981 in Winchester, Massachusetts, of French-Canadian descent, Favreau took a very precocious interest in politics after his Greek-American mother, Lillian, backed Michael Dukakis in the 1988 presidential contest. But it was as a scholarship student majoring in political science at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, that his passion was truly ignited. Just as Obama's politics emerged from his experience as a community organiser, so Favreau was inspired by his volunteer work for welfare recipients in Worcester. He wondered "why I would regularly encounter single working mothers who could not afford food, housing or medical care, despite the fact that they worked over 40 hours a week. If the idea was to get people off welfare rolls and into jobs, why were the jobs failing to provide even the most basic standard of living? These questions led me to Washington."

As a student, he interned in the press office of Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, where his talent was quickly recognised and he even helped ghostwrite some newspaper articles for Kerry himself. "This Favreau kid is really incredible," the senator's staff informed the internship organisers. Once he had graduated, he returned to Kerry's press office, which was now embroiled in a fight for the presidency. By the end of the (failed) campaign against Bush, Favreau had risen to become Kerry's top speech writer. But he was appalled by what he saw of politics in the 2004 race - the back-stabbing and divisiveness - and was ready to leave Washington for grad school. "After the Kerry campaign, after all the backbiting and nastiness, my idealism and enthusiasm for politics were crushed," he said. "I was grateful for the experience, but it was such a difficult experience, along with losing, that I was done. It took Barack to rekindle that." The first approach came from Robert Gibbs, Obama's communications director, who told the disenchanted Favreau that they were looking for a speech writer. He met Gibbs and the new senator for Illinois in the cafeteria in the Dirksen building on Capitol Hill. Obama wanted to know what had got him into politics and what his "theory of speech writing" was. "I have no theory," answered Favreau. "But when I saw you at the

[2004] convention, you basically told a story about your life from beginning to end, and it was a story that fit with the larger American narrative. People applauded not because you wrote an applause line, but because you touched something in the party and the country that people had not touched before. Democrats haven't had that in a long time."

This did the trick, and "Favs" was soon an indispensable member of the team. The approach taken by Obama and his young speech writer is one of the most intimate deployed by a president and a close aide. Karl Rove was often described as "Bush's Brain".

Favreau is described by Obama himself as a "mind-reader", able not only to provide a beautifully written draft but also to "channel"

Obama, to mimic his turns of phrase, his cadences and his approach to anecdote and quotation. Typically, the two men will sit together for half an hour, as Obama talks and Favreau types everything that he says: what he calls the "download". He then reshapes it into a draft. Obama works on the draft. The process continues until the two men are content.

In the case of the inaugural address delivered on 20 January 2009, Favreau worked on a draft in Starbucks with help from three colleagues, Ben Rhodes, Adam Frankel and Sarah Hurwitz (the latter two assisted with the now-famous ending of the speech, which alluded to a message sent to the American people by Washington when the outcome of their revolution was in doubt: "Let it be told to the future world that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive, that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet it"). Over the weekend of 10 and 11 January, Obama sequestered himself in the Hay-Adams Hotel and redrafted the text to his satisfaction.

The fruits of the collaboration between the president and Favreau have often been sensational. Favreau is credited with Obama's most famous slogan - "Yes We Can". There have been other such encapsulations that have made their way into the political bloodstream, such as the president's call in this year's State of the Union address for a "Sputnik moment" - a technological leap forward. Much more remarkable, however, has been the high quality of Obama's oratory in general, his ability to soar as a rhetorician, deploying political arts that are traditional and rooted in the classics rather than the television and internet age.

Both he and Favreau dislike sound bites and the "laundry list" convention of the modern political speech - a long inventory of achievements - and spend much more time on "narrative" (the story a speech tells) and "naming" (the explicit identification of problems or challenges).

In the extraordinary speech written by Favreau for the Jefferson-Jackson dinner in Iowa in November 2007, for instance, Obama declared that "the same old Washington textbook campaigns just won't do in this election. That's why not answering questions because we are afraid our answers won't be popular, just won't do.

That's why telling the American people what we think they want to hear instead of telling the American people what they need to hear just won't do. Triangulating and poll-driven positions because we're worried about what Mitt [Romney] or Rudy [Giuliani] might say about us just won't do." This was a lethal attack upon the focus-group-obsessed Clintons, but delivered with a grace and impact that persuaded many for the first time that Obama might just be the man.

Favreau made a similar contribution to the speech on race delivered in March 2008, after the disclosure of the anti-American ranting of Obama's pastor, Jeremiah Wright. "I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community," the embattled candidate said. "I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother - a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe." But, Obama continued, "the profound mistake of Reverend Wright's sermons is not that he spoke about racism in our society. It's that he spoke as if our society was static; as if no progress has been made." Again, this is a speech that will be anthologised and studied long after the detail of the legislation that Obama enacted as president is forgotten.

Of course, speeches on the campaign trail are quite different to speeches in office. In early 2008, Hillary Clinton repeated an adage made famous by Mario Cuomo: "You campaign with poetry, but you govern with prose" - Obama's speeches were poetic, but running the country could not be achieved by pretty rhetoric alone. To an extent, her prophecy has come true: in his first year as president, Obama made 411 "speeches, comments and remarks" (according to the official categorisation), almost all of them churned out by Favreau's office. Yet few of them had much, if any, direct impact upon the president's fortunes. The fight to secure healthcare reform, the midterm elections, the ongoing battle to secure sustainable economic recovery and the December tax cuts: these are what really mattered, big, crunchy political struggles.

Before his death, Sorensen made an acute critique of Obama's governing style. "I think that [Obama is] a remarkable speaker,"

Sorensen said, "but his speeches are still largely in campaign mode." Ouch.

Does that mean Favreau is now a marginal figure? Hardly. As he struggles to find a new idiom and a fresh language with which to reconnect with Middle America, and to reach out to Republicans in Congress, Obama will turn first to his trusted wordsmith - now more than ever, in fact. As he seeks imaginative ways of understanding and explaining the Arab uprisings, he will broaden his circle of advisors, as all presidents do - but always return to his "mind-reader" for help with the words. It is in the president's nature so to do.

Look at the deftness with which Obama's State of the Union address this year presented the horrific Tucson massacre - in which 19 people were shot - as evidence not of the divisions within America, but of the urgent need to unify. "Amid all the noise and passions and rancour of our public debate, Tucson reminded us that no matter who we are or where we come from, each of us is a part of something greater - something more consequential than party or political preference. We are part of the American family. We believe that in a country where every race and faith and point of view can be found, we are still bound together as one people; that we share common hopes and a common creed; that the dreams of a little girl in Tucson are not so different than those of our own children, and that they all deserve the chance to be fulfilled."

Pure Favreau. Pure Obama. An indivisible team with a lot more to do, and one more election to win. Will they prevail? Too early to say. But I bet you that, in his head at least, in moments of caffeine-soaked exhaustion late at night, Favs is already working on the biggest speech of them all, the crowning achievement: the second inaugural address. Can he write it? Yes He Can.

Originally published in the June 2011 issue of British GQ .

Jon Favreau

• Born June 2 , 1981 · Winchester, Massachusetts, USA
• Birth name Jonathan Edward Favreau
• Jon Favreau was born on June 2, 1981 in Winchester, Massachusetts, USA. He is a writer and producer, known for Running with Beto (2019) , Wind of Change and Will.i.am: Yes We Can (2008) . He has been married to Emily Black since June 17, 2017. They have one child.
• Spouse Emily Black (June 17, 2017 - present) (1 child)
• Relatives Andy Favreau (Sibling)
• Former speechwriter for Barack Obama and John Kerry .
• Brother of Andy Favreau .

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Jon Favreau

Speechwriter for president obama.

TRANSCRIPT: JON FAVREAU INTERVIEW

OBAMA: IN PURSUIT OF A MORE PERFECT UNION

Jon Favreau working on a speech with President Barack Obama.

Jon Favreau is a political commentator, podcaster and the former Director of Speechwriting for President Barack Obama. Favreau first began writing for Obama in 2005 during his first term as a US Senator and held the role as head speechwriter throughout the 2008 campaign and presidency, until 2013. During Obama’s presidency, Favreau became the second-youngest chief White House speechwriter on record. Over the course of eight years, Favreau had a hand in crafting nearly every major speech Obama delivered. In 2017, a few years after leaving the White House, Favreau co-founded Crooked Media, where he is a co-host of Pod Save America and the host of The Wilderness.

"Half the people think I write Obama's speeches; the other half think I'm on 'Entourage.' So I'm at the level of fame where people kind of know who I am, but they confuse me with other people."  Jon Favreau

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