President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama walk to the podium before he delivers remarks at a Cinco de Mayo reception May 5, 2010 in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, DC. Cinco de Mayo, May Fifth in Spanish, celebrates the unlikely victory of 5,000 ill-equipped Mestizo and Zapotec Indians led by General Ignacio Zaragoza over the the much better-equipped French forces at the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862 in Puebla, Mexico. In the US, Cinco de Mayo is often mistakenly equated with Mexican Independence which was on September 16, 1810.