Obama’s new summer season playlist has Vince Staples, Doechii, BossMan Dlow and Drake all touchdown within the Hip-Hop part.

Barack Obama launched his 2026 summer season playlist Thursday and proved that his Hip-Hop ear will get sharper with each passing season.

The previous president posted greater than 40 tracks on Instagram, briefly honoring Glen Hansard earlier than attending to a rap part with actual credibility.

Vince Staples earned his spot with “White Flag,” a politically direct single from Cry Child, his 2026 album that arrived June 5 on Loma Vista Data.

The video for “White Flag” exhibits Staples coating an American flag white earlier than taking pictures it, and that degree of political weight is precisely what attracts Obama to present Hip-Hop.

Doechii and SZA’s collaborative observe “lady, stand up” additionally made the playlist, a December 2025 launch that addressed misogyny and on-line backlash within the trade.

BossMan Dlow and A Tribe Known as Quest’s basic “Award Tour” additionally appeared on the listing, giving Obama’s playlist a spread from present lure to foundational ’90s Hip-Hop.

Drake additionally made the lower, persevering with a sample the place Obama contains the Toronto rapper no matter no matter controversy is swirling round him within the trade.

Obama break up the listing evenly between modern releases and well-known classics, which is precisely the method he’s taken in previous years.

Obama devoted the playlist’s opening to Glen Hansard, who died Wednesday at 56 in a motorbike accident. Obama wrote on Instagram, “Our hearts exit to his household,” tying the opening of the playlist to Hansard’s 2012 track “Track of Good Hope.”

Obama has been sharing summer season playlists since 2015, and the Hip-Hop picks have persistently been essentially the most debated a part of annually’s listing.

AllHipHop coated his 2025 year-end picks, which positioned Kendrick Lamar and Drake collectively regardless of their very public feud.

Previous playlists have featured Nas, Jay-Z, Kendrick Lamar, GloRilla, Ice Spice and Migos, protecting each legendary names and newer acts on the precise proper moments of their careers.

He claimed in a previous interview that he curates these lists personally, pushing again on skeptics who assumed a staffer was chargeable for his style.

Obama printed his annual studying listing containing 11 books the day earlier than the playlist landed on Instagram, giving followers two separate lists to unpack this week.

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