CHICAGO — The ceremony celebrating the opening of the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park kicked off Thursday morning with a string of dignitaries and celebrities taking the stage a few minutes after 11 a.m.

Former President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama, who returned to town last week, welcomed former presidents George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Joe Biden, as well as international leaders, Chicagoans and longtime supporters for the dedication.

About a half-hour before the event began, a number of political leaders milled about, speaking to and greet each other, including U.S. Rep. Nancy Pelosi, Speaker Emerita of the House, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, former Chicago Mayor and Obama Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, and Arne Duncan, who was the Education Department secretary under Obama. U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, who is retiring at the end of his term early next year, and Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton, who is the Democratic nominee seeking to succeed Durbin, were also in attendance, as were Hollywood directors Steven Spielberg and George Lucas. Gov. JB Pritzker was seen chatting with actor Tom Hanks.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and former German Chancellor Angela Merkel were in attendance as well.

The American band The Roots opened the ceremony with several songs.

The event is being held in the center’s outdoor main plaza, named after the late civil rights icon U.S. Rep. John Lewis of Georgia.

Music has been a tradition for the Obamas, and after the opening, Chicagoan Jennifer Hudson sang the national anthem. Others expected to entertain included Bruce Springsteen, Stevie Wonder, and rock band U2 members Bono and The Edge. The invocation was led by the Rev. Joel Hunter, a Florida-based evangelical pastor who has prayed with and advised Obama since his first election, and Joshua DuBois, a former Obama staffer during his time in the U.S. Senate and a spiritual adviser known for sending Obama daily devotionals.

Both Obamas will speak, as will business owner Marty Nesbitt, who chairs the Obama Foundation, and the foundation’s CEO, Valerie Jarrett.

The foundation held the ceremony in more favorable weather than had been feared earlier, as Wednesday’s storms cleared to a partly sunny day in the high 60s. Clinton’s presidential museum dedication in Little Rock, Arkansas, was beset by a downpour.

For those who didn’t receive an invite to the event or tickets to the watch party along the Midway Plaisance, the foundation was streaming the event on its social media pages.

The celebratory nature of the event stands in sharp contrast to a nation that is currently sharply divided along political lines. The Obama center is holding a ceremonial retrospective of the history-making election of the country’s first Black president at a time when the nation prepares to honor its 250th birthday and is clouded by the controversial presidency of Donald Trump.

Trump, who has made Chicago a political punching bag since his first term and earlier this week shared on social media an AI-generated image of the OPC’s museum tower as a trash can surrounded by encampments, was not invited. He is returning from France, where the G-7 nations’ meeting was held.

The event comes as a new CNN poll conducted by the research firm SSRS found that Obama is viewed positively by 57% of the American public, far ahead of his predecessors and successors.

Trump is viewed favorably by 34% and unfavorably by 55%; Biden stands at 30% favorable and 54% unfavorable. George W. Bush is viewed favorably by 42% and unfavorably by 33% and Clinton has a 38% to 39% favorable-to-unfavorable rating.

Obama is viewed unfavorably by 32% of the public, according to the poll results of 2,480 adults aged 18 and over who were surveyed May 7-31. The survey has an error margin of 2.7%.

Before the ceremony began, U.S. Rep. Lauren Underwood of Naperville said she cried when, in May, she saw the exhibit inside the center about the Affordable Care Act.

“I was like, we did that! And now we’re fighting the same fight again. But the American people understand that they’ve lost, and they’re angry about it. And I think that’s what this election will be about. It’s a health care election. It’s a cost election,” she said. “First of all, America is bigger than Donald Trump. And he doesn’t get to define the legacy of the 250 years of this country. This is our country. And I think what’s so extraordinary about president and Mrs. Obama choosing to do this in the shadows of Juneteenth, meaning Freedom Day, is I think of Juneteenth as less of a celebration and more of a call to action, and I think that we have to be reminded of what we’ve done before, the battles we’ve won, the change we have brought forth, and recommit ourselves to taking action as we’re moving forward, and I think that you know, the president is going to speak to some of that today.”

Stratton said the fact that the opening of the center was occurring on Juneteenth weekend shows “that this center is a center that’s focused on President Barack Obama from right here in the city of Chicago, in the state of Illinois, who was the first Black president. So it’s a celebration, and you can feel the energy, and this is not something that is focused on dividing and how to put other people down, this is all about how we’ve built each other up, and it’s just really exciting to see the real contrast, to me, about what is happening here today.”

Emanuel said when he toured the Obama center three months ago, he called the president and told him “it fulfills all of your dreams of making it not a presidential library, but a campus that inspires people to future work.”

The museum and the rest of the campus — a forum building, parkland and Chicago Public Library branch — will formally open to the public on Friday, June 19, which is Juneteenth, a federal holiday commemorating the emancipation of enslaved African Americans. The opening will cap off a more-than-decade-long development and construction saga held up by lawsuits, construction delays and the reworking of one of the city’s most historic parks and a major thoroughfare.

The Obamas and foundation leadership have described the project as an effort to give back to the South Side, and they are banking on the center becoming a tourist attraction that will provide an economic boost and first-class amenity to adjacent neighborhoods.

The Obamas have made a handful of public appearances since coming back to town, including meeting with kids at the campus playground and a thank-you celebration on Tuesday with people who worked on various aspects of the museum and campus. There, both Obamas spoke of Chicago’s centrality to their life’s work.

“Most of what has been important in my life is because of this place and the people here, because the people here taught me resilience and courage and hope,” the former president, U.S. senator and state senator said Tuesday. “When I went to Washington and when we started campaigning around the country, I was carrying a piece of this community with me the entire time.”

Michelle Obama, who grew up not far from Jackson Park, said she hoped the center “will be the beginning of telling the kids in this community that they are just as important, just as capable, just as valuable” and worthy of investment as the parks and cultural attractions downtown.

Appearing on a podcast for Washington, D.C.-based Punchbowl News in Chicago, Pritzker made a pitch for people to visit the center, saying, “You’ll become a Democrat if you go.”

“I just want everybody to know we’re having festivities this week that are well deserved, because this is not only a phenomenal development for the city of Chicago, but also people who will visit this are going to experience, first, what the Obama presidency was all about, but second, it’s a beautiful, beautiful facility. They’ve done an amazing job,” Pritzker said.

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