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According to a post on Slashdot:

Every single elected president - INCLUDING Barack Obama, has a genealogy related to President George Washington.

Note I did say Elected President. Gerald Ford is (as of yet), not known to be related to George Washington.

Barck Obama is George Washington's 9th cousin, 6 times removed. Yes, this is through his white mother.

From what I can tell, the least connected elected President was Martin Van Buren - 17th cousin thrice removed.

Also, President William Henry Harrison was related by marraige, not by blood.

my source [geni.com]

This seems to be a rather extraordinary claim.

I'm skeptical of whether this is in fact an extraordinary event. If it is indeed extraordinary I am skeptical the source.

The claim may not be particularly extraordinary if many or most of American descent are related to George Washington. How common is it to be related to him?

In any case, does the source adequately support the conclusion?

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Define "related" for the purposes of this discussion. Does mitochondrial Eve count? – dmckee Dec 28 '11 at 1:36
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I agree with @dmckee...I am related to every US president and every Russian head of state. You need to add some limits to 'related' – Rory Alsop Dec 28 '11 at 9:56
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@dmckee I think that your comment, if referenced, would be a valid answer! I am simply skeptical this is news at all, not that this is valid. Maybe the fact that we all share 99.9% of our DNA should be taken as a hint that we are all related? :-) – Sklivvz♦ Dec 28 '11 at 11:01
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I assume the intention here is "related"=="can trace a geneological relationship." So for this to be true, there would need to be a known, researched/documented relationship between every president and Washington, not just for the relationship to exist (which is trivial). – Ziv Dec 28 '11 at 12:11
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@BrianM.Hunt basic maths here. If we can assume an average total fertility rate of 4 children per woman, given that we go back a few hundred years, then we can join 60 million people in a family tree with (at least) 13 degrees. Some presidents are 17 degrees separated, so it's mathematically hardly surprising. – Sklivvz♦ Dec 30 '11 at 10:08
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