Sunny, the Portuguese water dog who joined the Obama family in the White House in 2013, has died at 13, former President Barack Obama said.
“Yesterday, we lost a cherished member of our family,” Obama wrote in a Facebook post Wednesday, describing Sunny’s death as a loss felt across the household he shares with former First Lady Michelle Obama and their daughters.
The Obamas got Sunny at the start of Obama’s second presidential term, and she quickly became inseparable from the family’s first dog, Bo, who had joined them four years earlier. “We got Sunny at the start of our second term in the White House, and all of us – including our first dog, Bo – immediately fell in love,” Obama wrote.
Obama described Sunny as “a force of nature,” writing that she was “athletic and full of boundless energy” and would “leap over the hedges on the South Lawn like they weren’t even there, chasing squirrels, birds and anything else that moved.” He said she preferred rough play to treats, was “fiercely protective” of Bo, and — despite her water-dog breed — “hated getting wet.”
“But as far as our family was concerned, she was pretty much perfect, and for thirteen years, she would be by our side – always loyal, always sweet, always ready for adventure, still fiery and gorgeous till the very end of her days,” Obama wrote.
Bo died of cancer in 2021 at age 12. “We will miss her terribly, and imagine she’s with her big brother now, making sure he’s okay,” Obama wrote of Sunny.
Sunny and Bo were fixtures of the Obama White House during the president’s second term, appearing in official photos and at public events, including a 2015 meeting between the Obamas and Pope Francis in the Oval Office. The dogs remained with the family after they left the White House in 2017.
Obama’s announcement drew tens of thousands of reactions and comments on Facebook within hours, many from users sharing their own stories of losing pets.