Joe Biden – Updated Oct 2023

Joe Biden is an American longtime politician who was elected the 46th President of the United States following the 2020 presidential election. Joe Biden has served as Vice President of the United States for two terms under President Barack Obama. And, he was the US Senator from Delaware for 36 years as well.

Early Life

Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. was born on November 20, 1942, at St. Mary’s Hospital in Scranton, Pennsylvania, USA. Joe Biden was born under the astrological sign Scorpio and he is 80 years old. He holds American nationality.

His parents’ names are Catherine Eugenia “Jean” Biden and Joseph Robinette Biden Sr. But both of his parents have passed away. Likewise, he is the oldest child in their Catholic family. He has a sister whose name is Valerie and two brothers whose names are Francis and James. His mother was of Irish descent, with roots traced variously to County Louth and County Londonderry. Moreover, his father’s parents, Mary Elizabeth and Joseph H. Biden were of English, French, and Irish descent. Biden’s grandfather is an oil businessman from Baltimore, Maryland.

Initially, Joe Biden’s father was wealthy but had suffered several financial setbacks by the time Biden was born. And for several years their family lived with Biden’s maternal grandparents. Likewise, Scranton also fell into economic decline during the 1950s. And his father could not find steady work because of that. Beginning in the year 1953, Biden’s family lived for several years in an apartment in Claymont, Delaware, then moved to a house in Wilmington, Delaware. His father later became a successfully used car salesman, maintaining the family a middle-class lifestyle.

Caption: Joe Biden’s childhood picture with his mother and siblings (Source: Google)

Education

At the Archmere Academy in Claymont, Joe Biden was a standout halfback and wide receiver on the high school football team. He also played baseball. He was a poor student but a natural leader and was class president in his junior and senior years. Likewise, he graduated in the year 1961.

Moreover, at the University of Delaware in Newark, Biden briefly played freshman football and earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in the year 1965 with a double major in history and political science and a minor in English. Likewise, he had a C average and was ranked 506th in his class of 688. Moreover, Biden has a stutter, which has improved since his early twenties. And, he says he has reduced it by reciting poetry before a mirror however it has been suggested that it affected his performance in the 2020 Democratic Party presidential debates.

Moreover, in the year 1968, Biden received a law degree from Syracuse University College of Law and ranked 76th in his class of 85. Then, he was admitted to the Delaware bar in the year 1969. Likewise, while in school, Biden received student draft deferments, and afterward was classified as unavailable for military service due to asthma.

Career and Professional Life

In the year 1968, Joe Biden clerked at a Wilmington law firm headed by prominent local Republican William Prickett and, he later said, “thought of myself as a Republican”. However, he disliked incumbent Democratic Delaware governor Charles L. Terry’s conservative racial politics and supported a more liberal Republican, Russell W. Peterson. Then, he was recruited by local Republicans but registered as an Independent.

Likewise, in the year 1969, he practiced law first as a public defender and then at a firm headed by a locally active Democrat. Subsequently, he reregistered as a Democrat. Later, he and another attorney also formed a law firm. Likewise, Corporate law, however, did not appeal to him, and criminal law did not pay well. So, he supplemented his income by managing properties. Later that same year Biden was elected to a county council seat in a usually Republican district of New Castle County, Delaware. He also served on the council, while still practicing law, until 1972. And, he even opposed large highway projects that might disrupt Wilmington neighborhoods.

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Furthermore, in the year 1972, Biden defeated Republican incumbent J. Caleb Boggs to become the junior U.S. senator from Delaware. And, he was the only Democrat willing to challenge Boggs. His campaign had almost no money, and had no chance of winning. Also, family members managed and staffed the campaign, which relied on meeting voters face-to-face and hand-distributing position papers, an approach made feasible by Delaware’s small size.

He later received some help from the AFL–CIO and Democratic pollster Patrick Caddell. Then, his platform focused on withdrawal from Vietnam, the environment, civil rights, mass transit, more equitable taxation, health care, and public dissatisfaction with “politics as usual”. And, a few months before the election Biden trailed Boggs by almost thirty percentage points, but his energy, attractive young family, and ability to connect with voters’ emotions worked to his advantage, and he won with 50.5 percent of the vote.

Biden along with President Jimmy Carter

During Biden’s early years in the Senate, he focused on consumer protection and environmental issues. Then, in the year 1974, Time named him one of the 200 Faces for the Future. Likewise, in a 1974 interview, Biden described himself as liberal on civil rights and liberties, senior citizens’ concerns, and healthcare but conservative on other issues, including abortion and military conscription.

Biden then became a ranking minority member of the Senate Judiciary Committee in the year 1981. And, in the year 1984, he was a Democratic floor manager for the successful passage of the Comprehensive Crime Control Act; over time. His supporters praised him for modifying some of the law’s worst provisions, and it was his most important legislative accomplishment to that time. In the year 1993, Biden voted for a provision that deemed homosexuality incompatible with military life, thereby banning gays from serving in the armed forces. And, in the year 1996, he voted for the Defense of Marriage Act, which prohibited the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages, thereby barring individuals in such marriages from equal protection under federal law and allowing states to do the same.

Moreover, he also communicated with American concerns, and secured changes that addressed the Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s objections. And, he even received considerable attention when he excoriated Secretary of State George Shultz at a Senate hearing for the Reagan administration’s support of South Africa despite its continued policy of apartheid.

Related to Busing

In the mid-1970s, he was one of the Senate’s leading opponents of race-integration busing. And, in his first Senate campaign, he expressed support for busing to remedy de jure segregation, as in the South. But opposed its use to remedy de facto segregation arising from racial patterns of neighborhood residency. Then, in May 1974, he voted to table a proposal containing anti-busing and anti-desegregation clauses but later voted for a modified version qualifying.

Later, in the year 1975, he supported a proposal that would have prevented the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare from cutting federal funds to districts that refused to integrate. At the same time, he also supported initiatives on housing, job opportunities, and voting rights. Moreover, Biden supported a measure forbidding the use of federal funds for transporting students beyond the school closest to them.

The Year 1987

Biden formally declared his candidacy for the 1988 Democratic presidential nomination on June 9, 1987. He was a very strong candidate because of his moderate image, his speaking ability, his high profile as chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee at the upcoming Robert Bork Supreme Court nomination hearings, and his appeal to Baby Boomers. And he raised more in the first quarter of 1987 than any other candidate.

Biden also made several false or exaggerated claims about his early life that he had earned three degrees in college. He also said that he had attended law school on a full scholarship and that he had graduated in the top half of his class, and that he had marched in the civil rights movement.

Senate Judiciary and Senate Foreign Relations Committee

Biden spoke at the signing of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act in 1994. He was a longtime member of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary. As chairman, Biden presided over two highly contentious U.S. Supreme Court confirmation hearings. He was also praised for his fairness, humor, and courage. Moreover, he has helped craft many federal crime laws.

As chairman of the International Narcotics Control Caucus, Biden wrote the laws that created the U.S. “Drug Czar”, who oversees and coordinates national drug control policy. In the year 2003, he introduced the Reducing Americans’ Vulnerability to Ecstasy Act’. He also worked to control “date rape drugs” such as flunitrazepam, party drugs such as ecstasy and ketamine, and commonly abused steroids such as androstenedione.

Biden addresses the press after meeting with Prime Minister Ayad Allawi in Baghdad in the year 2004. He was a longtime member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He became its ranking minority member in the year 1997 and his positions were generally liberal internationalists. Biden was co-chairman of the NATO Observer Group in the Senate as well.

Others

Biden strongly supported increased Amtrak funding and rail security. Beginning in the year 1991, he co-taught a seminar on constitutional law at Widener University School of Law. Likewise, during the 2000s, he sponsored bankruptcy legislation sought by credit card issuers. He also held up trade agreements with Russia when it stopped importing U.S. chickens. As of the year 2018, Biden was the 18th-longest-serving senator in U.S. history.

Biden has a reputation for loquacity and he is a strong speaker and debater and an influential guest on Sunday morning talk shows. He often deviates from prepared remarks. Biden chose not to run for president in the year 1992 in part. He had voted against authorizing the Gulf War and did not run in 2004 because, he said, he felt he had little chance of winning and could best serve the country by remaining in the Senate. However, in January 2007, he declared his candidacy in the 2008 election.

Moreover, he had difficulty raising funds, struggled to draw people to his rallies, and failed to gain traction against the high-profile candidacies of Obama and Senator Hillary Clinton. And, he never rose above single digits in national polls of the Democratic candidates. Despite its lack of success, his 2008 campaign raised his stature in the political world. In particular, it changed the relationship between Biden and Barack Obama.

Vice-presidential campaign

Shortly after Biden withdrew from the presidential race, Obama privately told him that he wanted to find an important place for Biden in his administration. However, he declined Obama’s first request to vet him for the vice-presidential slot, fearing the vice presidency would represent a loss in status and voice from his Senate position, but he later changed his mind. Then, in a June 22, 2008 interview, he said that while he was not actively seeking the vice-presidential nomination, he would accept it if offered. And, on August 22, 2008, Obama announced that Biden would be his running mate.

Moreover, in accepting Obama’s offer, Biden ruled out running for president again in the year 2016, but his comments in later years seemed to back off that stance, as he did not want to diminish his political power by appearing uninterested in advancement. Likewise, he was officially nominated for vice president on August 27 by voice vote at the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver. And, after his nomination, the Catholic bishop of Scranton, Pennsylvania, barred Biden from receiving Holy Communion there because he supported abortion rights, but Biden continued to receive Communion at his Delaware parish.

More About his Campaign

Furthermore, his vice-presidential campaigning gained little media visibility, as far greater press attention was focused on the Republican running mate, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. He nevertheless focused on campaigning in economically challenged areas of swing states and trying to win over blue-collar Democrats, especially those who had supported Hillary Clinton. He also participated in the vice-presidential debate with Palin at Washington University in St. Louis. Biden even campaigned in some normally Republican states, as well as in areas with large Catholic populations.

Under instructions from the campaign, Biden kept his speeches succinct and tried to avoid offhand remarks, such as one about Obama’s being tested by a foreign power soon after taking office, which had attracted negative attention. Likewise, on November 4, 2008, Obama and Biden were elected with 53% of the popular vote and 365 electoral votes to McCain–Palin’s 173. He also ran for reelection to his Senate seat as well as for the vice president, as permitted by Delaware law, and was reelected on November 4.

Having won both races, he made a point of holding off his resignation from the Senate so he could be sworn in for his seventh term. He also became the youngest senator ever to start a seventh full term.

Vice President

He said he intended to eliminate some of the explicit roles assumed by George W. Bush’s vice president, Dick Cheney, and did not intend to emulate any previous vice presidency. On January 20, he was sworn in as the 47th vice president of the United States, ‌the first vice president from Delaware, and the first Roman Catholic vice president.

Relation with Obama

The members of the Obama administration said Biden’s role in the White House was to be a contrarian and force others to defend their positions. Biden also campaigned heavily for Democrats in the 2010 midterm elections, maintaining an attitude of optimism in the face of predictions of large-scale losses for the party. Following big Republican gains in the elections and the departure of White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, his past relationships with Republicans in Congress became more important. Likewise, in foreign policy, Biden supported the NATO-led military intervention in Libya in 2011 and supported closer economic ties with Russia. In March 2011, Obama delegated Biden to lead negotiations between Congress and the White House in resolving federal spending levels for the rest of the year and avoiding a government shutdown.

In October 2010, Biden said Obama had asked him to remain as his running mate for the 2012 presidential election, but with Obama’s popularity on the decline, White House chief of staff William M. Daley conducted some secret polling and focus group research in late 2011 on the idea of replacing Biden on the ticket with Hillary Clinton. He spoke about same-sex marriage and that he was supportive of him, gaining considerable public attention in comparison to Obama’s position. Within days, Obama also announced that he too supported same-sex marriage. However, Biden apologized to Obama in private for having spoken out.

Obama and Biden share a very strong bond and were supportive of each other at all times and also respected each other a lot. Likewise, in December 2012, Obama named Biden to head the Gun Violence Task Force.

Presidential Campaign and More

Biden was inaugurated to a second term on January 20, 2013, at a small ceremony at Number One Observatory Circle, his official residence, with Justice Sonia Sotomayor presiding. He then continued to be at the forefront as, in the wake of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, the Obama administration put forth executive orders and proposed new gun control measures.

His Violence Against Women Act was reauthorized again in the year 2013. This act led to related developments, such as the White House Council on Women and Girls, begun in the first term, as well as the White House Task Force to Protect Students from Sexual Assault, begun in January 2014 with Biden and Valerie Jarrett as co-chairs. By the year 2015, a series of swearings-in and other events where Biden had placed his hands on women and girls and talked closely to them attracted attention both in the press and on social media.

During his second term, he prepared for a possible bid for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination. And, at the age of 74 on Inauguration Day in January 2017, he would have been the oldest president on inauguration in history. However, he didn’t run for president that year. Likewise, during the campaign season, Biden publicly displayed his disagreements with Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.

In the year 2017, Biden became the Benjamin Franklin Presidential Practice professor at the University of Pennsylvania, where he led the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement.

Healthcare, Immigration, and LGBTQ rights

On March 22, 2017, during Biden’s first appearance on Capitol Hill since Trump’s inauguration, he called the Republican healthcare bill a “tax bill” meant to transfer nearly $1 trillion used for health benefits for those struggling to wealthy Americans. Likewise, he disagreed with the decision of the House of Representatives and narrowly voted for the American Health Care Act. There are many things he disagreed with and tweeted things about related to healthcare and wealth spent on the health of the people of the country.

Biden has vowed to stop building the U.S.-Mexico border wall. Likewise, on September 5, 2017, after Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced that the Trump administration would rescind Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, Biden tweeted, “Brought by parents, these children had no choice in coming here. Now they’ll be sent to countries they’ve never known. Cruel. Not America”.

Talking about LGBTQ rights, he was the first to speak on gay marriage at a Human Rights Campaign event in Los Angeles in the year 2012. He even called LGBT workplace discrimination “close to barbaric” and “bizarre”.

2020 Presidential Campaign and Allegations

Between the years 2016 and 2019, media outlets often mentioned Biden as a likely candidate for president in the year 2020. Likewise, he launched his campaign on April 25, 2019. Before the elections, Trump was accused of many wrongdoings by Biden. However, all those allegations were wrong. And because of all these, there was a rumor that Trump did all these things to take Biden’s reputation down before the election so he wouldn’t win it. Likewise, throughout the year 2019, Biden stayed generally ahead of other Democrats in national polls.

Likewise, when Sanders suspended Biden’s campaign on April 8, 2020, he became the Democratic Party’s presumptive nominee for president. Later on, he met the 1,991-delegate threshold needed to secure the party’s presidential nomination, and then he announced U.S. Senator Kamala Harris of California as his running mate, making her the first African American and South Asian American vice-presidential nominee on a major-party ticket. Moreover, in August 2020, Biden was officially nominated at the 2020 Democratic National Convention as the Democratic Party nominee for president in the 2020 election.

Biden was accused of inappropriate contact with women at public events, such as embracing, kissing, gripping, or placing a hand on their shoulder. Then, he described himself as a “tactile politician” and admitted this behavior has caused trouble for him in the past. There were many girls as well as women who accused and told the public and media about Biden touching them inappropriately and they were not comfortable because of that. Later on, he then apologized for not understanding how people would react to his actions but said his intentions were honorable.

President-elect of the United States

Biden won the 46th President of the United States in November 2020, defeating the incumbent Donald Trump, the first sitting president to lose re-election since George H. W. Bush in the year 1992. Biden became the second non-incumbent vice president and the first Democrat to do so. And, he is also the oldest president at the time of inauguration, as well as the first president from Delaware.

Biden has been characterized as a moderate Democrat. He supported the fiscal stimulus in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 and also increased infrastructure spending proposed by the Obama administration like mass transit, including Amtrak, bus, and subway subsidies, reproductive rights, same-sex marriage, and the reduced military spending in the Obama administration’s fiscal year 2014 budget.

Likewise, Biden opposes drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and supports governmental funding to find new energy sources, and believes action must be taken on global warming. He also co-sponsored the Sense of the Senate resolution calling on the United States to participate in the United Nations climate negotiations and the Boxer–Sanders Global Warming Pollution Reduction Act, the most stringent climate bill in the United States Senate. His also program includes re-entering Paris Agreement, nature conservation, and green building.

As a senator, Biden forged deep relationships with police groups and was a chief proponent of a Police Officer’s Bill of Rights measure that police unions supported but police chiefs opposed.

Caption: Joe Biden speaking in an election (Source: Google)

Distinctions

President Obama presents Biden with the Presidential Medal of Freedom with Distinction. Biden has received honorary degrees from the University of Scranton, Saint Joseph’s University, Widener University School of Law, Emerson College, Delaware State University, his alma mater the University of Delaware, Suffolk University Law School, his other alma mater Syracuse University, Wake Forest University, the University of Pennsylvania, Miami Dade College, University of South Carolina, Trinity College, Dublin, Colby College, and Morgan State University.

He also received the Chancellor Medal and the George Arents Pioneer Medal from Syracuse University. He received Working Mother magazine’s Best of Congress Award for “improving the American quality of life through family-friendly work policies” as well. Biden got the Golden Medal of Freedom, the region’s highest award, for his vocal support for its independence in the late 1990s. The University of Notre Dame gave Biden the Laetare Medal, considered the highest honor for American Catholics.

Furthermore, Obama surprised Biden by awarding him the Presidential Medal of Freedom with Distinction‍ ‌for “faith in your fellow Americans, for your love of country and a lifetime of service that will endure through the generations”.

Relationship Status

Joe Biden married Neilia Hunter who was a student at Syracuse University. They had three children and their names are Joseph R. “Beau” Biden III, Robert Hunter Biden, and Naomi Christina “Amy” Biden. Unfortunately, in December 1972, Biden’s wife Neilia as well as their one-year-old daughter Amy died in an automobile accident in Hockessin, Delaware. Likewise, his sons Beau and Hunter respectively suffered a broken leg and a minor skull fracture but doctors predicted they would recover fully.

Biden and his second wife, Jill, met in the year 1975 and married in 1977. They have a daughter whose name is Ashley. Ashley is a social worker. Moreover, his son, Beau Biden became an Army Judge Advocate serving in the Iraq War, and later Delaware Attorney General but he died of brain cancer in the year 2015. And his other son, Hunter Biden is a Washington attorney and lobbyist.

Caption: Joe Biden along with his wife, Jill Biden (Source: Google)

Body Measurements

Joe Biden has a height of 6 feet 1 inch and his weight is 72 Kg. However, his other body measurements such as his chest size, hip size, bicep size, and waist size, are not available and they are still under review. Moreover, he has white hair and dark green eyes.

In February 1988, Biden went to Walter Reed Army Medical Center for surgery to correct a leaking intracranial berry aneurysm. And, while recuperating he suffered a pulmonary embolism, a serious complication. Likewise, after his second aneurysm, he remained away from the Senate for seven months.

Joe Biden – Social Media

Joe Biden is pretty active on his social accounts. He has garnered 12.4 million followers on Instagram and 17.6 million followers on Twitter. He often shares posts and tweets on his social accounts.

Joe Biden – Net Worth 2023

According to Marie-Claire, Biden has an estimated net worth of $9 million as of 2020. When his term as Vice President ended, Biden’s last financial disclosure pegged his net worth at $1.5 million. And, for many years before becoming VP, he would frequently refer to himself as one of the “poorest” members of congress, or “middle-class Joe”. And, in the years after leaving the White House he earned significant income mainly from speeches and book royalties, peaking in 2017 with an income of $11 million. Likewise, between the years 2016 and 2019 alone he and Jill earned a shade under $17 million.

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