Are Obama and Cheney Related? http://www.factcheck.

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By Viveca Novak Posted on March 18, 2008

Are Barack Obama and Dick Cheney cousins?

Yep. But they are quite distant relatives.

FULLANSWER
In an article last September, the Chicago Sun-Times laid out Obamas ancestry including the
genealogical, if not spiritual, relationship between Obama and Cheney. According to the
newspaper, they are ninth cousins once removed, with their common ancestor being
Mareen Duvall, a French Huguenot who settled in Maryland in the mid-1600s.
In an Oct. 16 interview on MSNBC, Lynne Cheney confirmed the connection based on
extensive research she did for her latest book, "Blue Skies, No Fences." However, she
calculates that Obama and Cheney are eighth cousins, one degree closer than the Sun-Times
has it. Duvall, according to Cheneys research, was the parent of the husband of the
granddaughter of a Cheney who bore the same first name as the vice president.
There will be a quiz later.
For those readers who, like some of us at FactCheck.org, are woefully short on cousins,
Genealogy.com has a nice explainer on the whole phenomenon.
Obamas other relatives, by the way, include George W. Bush, who, according to the
Sun-Times, is his 11th cousin. They share the same great-great-great-great-great-great-great-
great-great-great-grandparents, a 17th-century Massachusetts couple named Samuel
Hinckley and Sarah Soole Hinckley. And Harry S. Truman was Obamas fourth cousin four
times removed, the paper says. The New York Post, using ancestry.com, reported that Brad Pitt
and Obama are ninth cousins. Kenyan opposition leader Raila Odinga told the BBC that his
maternal uncle was Obamas father, making them first cousins (we think).
We wouldnt make too much of this, though. After all, according to at least some researchers,
a common ancestor for all humans now alive may have existed just several thousand years
ago. That means you, dear reader, could have a cousinly relationship that may not go all that
far back to everyone from Jack Kevorkian to Tina Fey to Hugo Chavez to the woman selling
trinkets from a piece of cardboard on a Bangalore street corner.
Viveca Novak

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Are Obama and Cheney Related? http://www.factcheck.org/2008/03/are-obama-and-cheney-related/

Sources
Rohde DLT, Olson S, Chang JT. "Modelling the recent common ancestry of all living humans".
Nature (2004)431: 562-566.
"Branching Out; Family Biographies." Chicago Sun-Times, 9 Sept. 2007.
Wade, Nicholas. "Cheney and Obama: Its Not Genetic." The New York Times, 21 Oct. 2007.
Simmons, Christine. "Vice President Dick Cheney and Democrat Barack Obama are eighth
cousins, Lynne Cheney says." The Associated Press, 17 Oct. 2007.
Otis, Ginger Adams. "Cousins by Dozens; Fruitful Search Through Family Trees." The New
York Post, 28 Oct. 2007.
"Odinga Says Obama is his Cousin." BBC News, 8 Jan. 2008.

Categories: Ask FactCheck

People: Dick Cheney and President Obama

Issues: Cousins

2 de 2 27/10/2016 12:19 p.m.