Cody Keenan is the former unpaid intern behind President Obama's amazing speeches Cody Keenan dressed as a pirate for Talk like a Pirate day. The President's former speech writer Jon Favreau has left to work in Hollywood. TODAY, he has gone home. And we have lost one of the most influential, courageous, and profoundly good human beings that any of us will share time with on this Earth," said President Obama last week after news broke that Nelson Mandela was dead, aged 95. What you may not know is that the touching tribute heard around the world, may not be his own, but the work of a former unpaid intern, Cody Keenan, who is the President's head speechwriter. Here's what you never knew about the man behind those epic speeches: Cody Keenan, 32, typically works from 7:45am until 2am as head of a team of speechwriters. Like the President, Keenan is from Chicago. He studied to be a surgeon, before switching to Chinese, then international studies, before falling in love with The West Wing and changing to political science. He hammered the pavements in Washington and scored an internship with Senator Ted Kennedy before working his way up to speechwriter. He then scored another internship on the Obama campaign working for Jon Favreau, the wunderkind who was hired at 23 and wrote Obama's famous inauguration speech. After Favreau left to work as a Hollywood screenwriter, Keenan stepped up to the top job. President Obama delivers a stirring speech in Tucson, Arizona following a mass shooting in the town. Courtesy C-Span. Before his first day he stayed up all night watching Obama on YouTube. "It was pretty scary, and I didn't want to let anyone down," he said. He meets with the President every Monday morning to discuss the week ahead, before drafting speeches which are checked by a team of policy advisers. He once described the job as like handing in a university paper. You get a paper assignment, you might pull an all-nighter or come in really early to finish, and you hand it in and then you get his marks back and find out whether he likes it or not. Sometimes they disagree, but Keenan said he argues "pretty well" for his point - something he never dared to do in the past. Keenan believers the role should be heard, but not seen and follows a mantra from President Roosevelt which says the president's aides should be "possessed of high competence ... and a passion for anonymity," according to an interview with his former university. One of his biggest successes was Obama's famous speech in Tucson, Arizona at the memorial for victims of the January 2011 shooting. It was described by US historian Ellen Fitzpatrick as "intensely personal, evoking the lives of the victims of this tragedy, describing the heroism of everyday Americans, and the theme of children." President Obama speaks at the 2009 White House Correspondents' Dinner. Traditionally poking fun at the administration and the journalists who cover Washington. He also wrote Obama's funny speech for the 2009 White House Correspondents Association dinner and the 2013 State of the Union, as well as key speeches throughout the recession, Arab Spring and the introduction of Obamacare. He said a good speech has four main elements: "Charity, clarity, levity, and brevity." Keenan said it's easy to get trapped inside the "Washington bubble" but the most important thing to remember is why you wanted to do the job in the first place. I have an immediate family member who was unemployed during the recession, so I know intimately how that challenges your sense of self-worth. I have friends who have served in Iraq. I have gay friends who are upset that change and equality haven't come quite fast enough," he once said in an interview. What do you think of Obama's famous speeches?