Obama agreed with Random House in 2004 to write a children's book, which, according to the publisher, he completed before he became president. "Of Thee I Sing" is part of a $1.9 million, three-book deal with Random House reached in 2004, according to a disclosure report filed in 2005, when Obama was a U.S. senator from Illinois. The other two books were nonfiction.
A financial disclosure form released by the White House in May 2010 refers to an agreement - originated in 2004, amended on Jan. 9, 2009, shortly before Obama became president - for a "nonfiction work, the subject to be determined," that would not come out while he was in office.