Malia Obama is most commonly known for being the daughter of former President Barack Obama – the president from 2009 until 2017. The majority of America witnessed Malia grow up throughout her time in the limelight, as Malia was just ten years old when her father became President in 2009. Ever since the Obama administration ended, the media’s coverage of Malia and her younger sister, Sasha, grew smaller and smaller as large media outlets were more seemingly focused on her father. But the big question is, what has Malia done since then?

Malia Obama has taken up a somewhat shocking career, becoming a film director and surprise debuting her first film “The Heart,” which premiered at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival, in which she was introduced as Malia Ann rather than her legal name of Obama. The reason for this is quite simple—Ann is her middle name. A likely and widely speculated reason as to why she has chosen not to use her first & last name simply could be an attempt to distance herself from the Obama name to escape any sort of involvement in the current political landscape.

This isn’t the first time we’ve heard of Malia’s interest—or even involvement—in film projects, as she was credited as a writer for Donald Glover’s show “Swarm, ” a Prime Video exclusive. She also attended Harvard University; her major is unknown, however.

Despite her attempts to prevent any nepotism accusations, reviewers immediately began to call Malia a “nepo baby,” which means that the sole reason for one’s fame, talent, or fortune is due to the person’s parents. Reviewers immediately began to criticize the short film, resulting in the film’s score on IMDb being only 5.6 out of 10, which translates to only about a 56% rating. Obama has not spoken out about the situation regarding the nepotism allegations.