In 1972, Democrat Joe Biden entered politics when he managed to get a seat in the Delaware Senate. The young senator gains a lot of experience here and decides to stand as a candidate for the 1988 American elections in 1987. The election campaign ends in a fiasco and Biden therefore withdraws. Many new terms in the Senate will follow when he decides to make another attempt as a presidential candidate in 2008. However, Biden manages to attract few voters and he once again leaves the race early. Biden is approached by Barack Obama as a ‘running mate’ and this leads to Joe Biden being sworn in as Vice President in January 2009. He will remain in this position until January 2017. The US presidential elections will take place again on November 3, 2020. Joe Biden is running for office one more time, this time successfully. He manages to defeat his Democratic rivals and remains the only Democratic presidential candidate.
Contents
- Youth and education
- Private life
- In the politics
- Candidacy in 1988
- Candidacy in 2008
- Vice Presidency Obama
- Candidacy 2020
- Biden wins nomination
- Points of view
- Controversy during campaign
- Run-up to the elections
- 2020 election results
Youth and education
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr., nickname Joe, was born on November 20, 1942 in Pennsylvania, America. He is the first child of Catherine and Joseph Biden, Joe has a sister and two brothers. Archmere Academy in Claymont is where Biden completed his high school years. Although his school results did not excel, his classmates described him as a natural leader. He was therefore elected class representative. Joe Biden is also very sporty. He plays baseball and American football. He obtained his diploma in 1961. Biden then studied history and political science at the University of Delaware, where he received his double bachelor’s degree in 1965. Joe will then attend law school at Syracuse University of Law.
Private life
During his college years, Joe Biden met Neilia Hunter in 1964. In 1966, Joe and Neilia tied the knot. They have three children together. Joseph Beau Biden was born in 1969, Robert Hunter followed in 1970 and Naomi Christina completed the family in 1971. Just before Christmas 1972, disaster struck. Neilia and Naomi are killed when the car they are in is hit by a truck. Sons Beau and Hunter are also injured, but survive the accident. Joe Biden is considering quitting his blossoming political career to take care of his sons. However, Biden ultimately does not do it and remains politically active.
In 1975, Joe Biden met teacher Jill Jacobs through a blind date. She is the one who gives him back his meaning in life and politics, according to Biden himself. In 1977, Joe and Jill married and in 1981 their marriage was crowned with the birth of daughter Ashley. In 2015, the Biden family is once again hit by a tragic death. Eldest son Beau dies at the age of 46 after battling a brain tumor for two years.
In the politics
In 1968, Joe Biden worked for a time for a law firm led by Republican William Prickett. Biden considers himself a Republican at the time, but cannot agree with the conservative way of thinking of the party. Biden also has such an aversion to Republican presidential candidate Richard Nixon that he is registering as an independent. A year later, in 1969, Biden is working in Sid Balick’s office. Balick is an active Democrat and managed to convince Joe Biden to register as a Democrat and so it happened. Biden is slowly becoming more and more involved in politics. He served on the New Castle County Council from 1970 to 1972. In 1972, Biden ran for the Delaware Senate. He is running against a real expert in the field, Republican J. Caleb Boggs. Although there is little money involved in the election campaign, the young Biden knows how to win people over with his positions on the withdrawal of American troops from Vietnam, better health care and proportional tax payments. In November 1972, Biden managed to win the elections and secured a place in the Senate.
In January 1973, Joe Biden was sworn into the Delaware Senate. Biden will be 30 years old and at that time the sixth youngest senator in American history. In the first years that Biden was in the Senate, his focus was mainly on consumer protection and environmental issues and he called for greater government accountability. Joe described himself as liberal on civil rights, elder care and health care, but as conservative on other issues such as abortion. In 1981, Joe Biden joins the US Senate Committee on the Judiciary.
Candidacy in 1988
In June 1987, Joe Biden runs for the 1988 American presidential elections on behalf of the Democrats. Biden is considered a strong candidate as he is a moderate Democrat, has good speaking skills and appeals to many baby boomers. Although Biden managed to raise no less than 1.7 million dollars for his campaign in a short time, his election campaign is going less smoothly than that of his competitors. In September 1987, Joe Biden gets into trouble when he plagiarizes a speech by British politician Neil Kinnock. His plagiarism comes to light and becomes public, which ultimately causes Biden to withdraw as a presidential candidate.
In retrospect, the early termination of the election campaign turned out to be a blessing in disguise for Joe Biden. In 1988, Biden suffered two brain aneurysms. In February of that year, Joe goes to the hospital with severe neck pain where it turns out that an artery in the brain has started to leak. A few months later, in May, the politician underwent surgery for a second aneurysm. Joe Biden had to stop his political activities for no less than seven months. Joe Biden has not had any recurring aneurysms or side effects from the surgeries.
Candidacy in 2008
After the debacle of the 1987 election campaign, Biden resumes his duties in the Senate. Joe Biden was re-elected as senator no fewer than six times, in 1978, 1984, 1990, 1996, 2002 and 2008, often with a large majority of votes. During his time in the Senate, Biden has become known for his talkativeness, speaking well during debates and not mincing his words. After months of speculation, Biden announced on January 31, 2007 that he would be a candidate for the 2008 presidential elections.
During his election campaign, he mainly focused on his political experience in the Senate and his experience with foreign policy. Yet, unlike in 1988, Biden has difficulty raising money for his campaign and is also having difficulty attracting people to his rallies. The first primaries will take place on January 3, 2008 in Iowa. Biden receives less than one percent of the votes. His competitors Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton have gained much more popularity among the American people. Joe Biden withdraws from the race for president that same evening. Barack Obama will ultimately be elected the Democratic presidential candidate.
Vicepresidentschap Obama
After stopping his election campaign, Joe Biden is approached by Barack Obama for a possible vice presidency. The two learned to counter each other better during election campaigns in 2007. Biden initially declines this offer, fearing that it would lead to a loss of status and votes compared to his position in the Senate, but later changes his mind. On November 4, 2008, Barack Obama wins the presidential election against Republican John McCain with Joe Biden as his running mate and vice president. Although Biden has been re-elected to the Senate for no less than a seventh term, he must resign from the Delaware Senate after more than 36 years in order to be sworn in as the 47th Vice President of the United States on January 20, 2009. Although Biden is now in Obama’s shadow, he still does not mince his words. For example, in May 2012 he stated that he was in favor of gay marriage, while Obama had not yet commented on this. Biden apologizes to Obama behind closed doors and a few days later the president announces that he also supports gay marriage.
Preparations for Barack Obama’s re-election campaign began as early as 2010. Obama’s popularity among the American people has fallen and his team in the White House advises not to nominate Joe Biden as vice president again, but to bet on Hillary Clinton. Obama is not in favor of the idea and at the democratic convention in September 2012 it is officially announced that if Obama is re-elected, Joe Biden will again be the vice president. That’s how it happened because on November 6, 2012, Obama and Biden were re-elected by the people for a second term. They will be sworn in again on January 20, 2013.
Presidential elections will take place again in November 2016. Joe Biden is a frequently mentioned presidential candidate since Obama may not be re-elected for a third term. It is therefore a serious consideration for Biden, but the death of his son Beau in 2015, among other things, means that he will pass up the candidacy. Republican Donald Trump will ultimately be elected the 45th president of the United States, with Mike Pence as the new vice president. On January 12, 2017, Obama will carry out his last duties as president. During a press conference in which he says goodbye, he surprises a very emotional Joe Biden with the Presidential Medal of Freedom with Distinction.
Candidacy 2020
After his vice presidency, Joe Biden will receive a title as a professor at the University of Pennsylvania. When it comes to political activities, Biden is withdrawing for a while, although he does express his reservations about the presidency of Donald Trump. Time flies and on November 3, 2020, the American presidential elections will take place again. There has been long speculation about Joe Biden’s possible candidacy. Biden himself has his doubts, because what impact will a new presidential election race have on his family? He is also concerned about possible fundraising and perceptions that people may have about his age. His aversion to Trump’s presidency and the inexperience in foreign policy of the other Democratic presidential candidates ultimately win him over. On April 25, 2019, a new presidential election campaign will start with Joe Biden as presidential candidate.
Although Joe Biden is leading in the polls, the results of the first primaries are disappointing. The relatively unknown Pete Buttigieg wins the first primaries in Iowa in February 2020, closely followed by Bernie Sanders. Sanders wins the subsequent elections in New Hampshire and Nevada. In the primaries in South Carolina, Joe Biden manages to make his first move and win this state. The so-called Super Tuesday takes place on March 3; on this day, fourteen states go to the polls at the same time. Super Tuesday turns out to be a big victory for Joe Biden, as he wins in no fewer than ten states. Bernie Sanders has the remaining states in his name.
Biden wins nomination
More elections will follow, won by Biden, but in mid-March the global outbreak of a contagious lung virus throws a spanner in the works. Planned primaries are postponed to prevent gatherings with many people so that the virus does not spread further. Although there was no chance that Sanders would win the Democratic nomination after a series of losing primaries, the Democrat refused to give up. However, the virus makes Bernie Sanders decide to drop out of the race. As a result, Joe Biden will be the only remaining Democratic presidential candidate and will win the nomination. In June, Biden managed to rally enough delegates to formally participate in the elections on behalf of the Democrats. Joe Biden will face Donald Trump on November 3.
Many former candidates already supported Biden, but on April 13, former rival Sanders also called on Democrats to vote for Joe Biden in November. After this, former President Barack Obama also officially expresses his support for his former Vice President Biden. It is not yet known who will be Joe Biden’s vice president when he becomes president in April 2020. Biden has indicated that he prefers a woman and that his running mate must be younger than Biden himself. If he is elected president in November 2020, Joe Biden will be the oldest American president ever at his inauguration in January 2021, at the age of 78. At the Democratic Party Congress, which will take place in August 2020, Biden will be officially elected as the Democratic presidential candidate. His ‘running mate’ must therefore be known. Biden keeps it exciting. In the week before the Democratic convention, Joe Biden will announce his running mate. Should Joe Biden win the US elections in November, Senator Kamala Harris will become his vice president. Harris was also a presidential candidate, but left the race in December 2019. Kamala Harris is a politician who has been a senator in the state of California since 2017. Previously, she was attorney general in the same state.
Points of view
From the start of his political career, Joe Biden has been described as a moderate Democrat. This means that one is not left or right on the political spectrum, but is in the middle in terms of political positions. On health care, Biden advocates better insurance for the American people. However, he is an opponent of the Medicare for All plan, which was supported by Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, among others. This plan would make the government the country’s main health insurer and Biden is not in favor of it. Biden remains behind the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare, which seeks to reduce medical care costs and make insurance policies cheaper. Biden is also in the middle of the spectrum on the immigration issue. He voted for a 2006 law that allowed for more walls and fences to be built along the border with Mexico, but said in January 2019 that the wall that Donald Trump is building along the border is not the kind of border security that is needed.
Climate change is also an important agenda item in 2020. Biden supports the Paris Accords as part of the climate treaty, but did not support the so-called Green New Deal that many left-wing Democrats voted for. Although Joe Biden was previously in favor of the death penalty, he appeared to have changed his opinion in 2019. When carrying out the death penalty, the risk would be too great that someone who has been wrongly convicted would still be executed. While most Democrats support the legalization of cannabis, Biden thinks differently about this. He is in favor of decriminalizing the use of cannabis, but is only in favor of legalizing its use for medical reasons. When it comes to raising taxes, Joe Biden advocates higher taxes on the incomes of wealthy Americans. He also wants to encourage tax cuts for middle-income families.
It was previously mentioned that Joe Biden is in favor of gay marriage, but when it comes to LGBTQ rights, Biden still has an opinion. During the Obama administration, transgender people were allowed to join the US military. Trump reversed this decision. Joe Biden wants to reintroduce this policy if he is elected president of the United States. Finally, Joe Biden’s position on abortion. Although Biden views abortion as wrong, he believes that women should be able to have an abortion legally. He has also changed his position on the Hyde Amendment. This law prohibits public money from being used to perform abortions. Biden is now open to repealing this law.
Controversy during campaign
Joe Biden cannot escape controversies during the 2020 election campaign. For example, in March 2020, a video appeared online in which Biden had a discussion with a construction worker about the ownership of weapons by Americans during a visit. Biden is in favor of a ban on automatic weapons, which culminates in a discussion with the construction worker, in which Biden calls the questioner full of shit. The video circulated the internet and received mixed reactions. The campaign team states that they are satisfied with how Biden behaved during the resulting altercation. Yet Biden often suffers from such excesses and slips of the tongue. Donald Trump responds to this by stating that Joe Biden’s mental health is deteriorating rapidly.
Then there’s the case with Tara Reade. In April 2019, three women told The Washington Post that Joe Biden touched them in ways that made them feel uncomfortable. That same day, Tara Reade, a former Senate staffer, also came forward with the story that Biden touched her inappropriately on her shoulders and neck. Joe Biden apologizes and says he misjudged how people might react to his actions. He also says that he had no wrong intentions. This seems to be the end of the matter, but Reade will file a complaint against Biden in April. According to Reade, he sexually assaulted her in 1993. On May 1, 2020, Biden releases an official statement denying Tara Reade’s accusations. “They aren’t true. This never happened,” said Joe Biden.
Run-up to the elections
In the run-up to the elections of November 3, 2020, a number of so-called ‘presidential debates’ will take place. These are debates between current Republican President Donald Trump and Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden. The first debate took place on September 29. The other two debates will take place on October 15 and 22. On October 7, there will be another debate between current Vice President Mike Pence and Joe Biden’s running mate, Kamala Harris. The first debate on September 29 is chaotic. Biden and Trump quickly get into each other’s throats and do not let each other finish and there is no clear winner from the debate.
On October 2, 2020, it appears that Donald Trump became infected with the coronavirus. This means that he was already carrying the coronavirus during the debate, in which Trump ridiculed Biden for wearing a mask against this contagious virus. Joe and Jill Biden are therefore also tested, but the result is negative. Trump’s infection with the coronavirus means that the debate on October 15 will not take place. The Democrats propose organizing a virtual debate, but Donald Trump does not want to participate. The second debate between the presidential candidates is therefore cancelled. The next and final debate before the elections took place on October 22. The debate is more civil than the previous debate, this time the two presidential candidates let each other talk it out. According to a poll by the CNN television network, Joe Biden will emerge as the winner, but his lead is not very large. Joe Biden also has a lead over Trump in the polls. However, Hillary Clinton also had that lead in 2016 and Donald Trump still won.
2020 election results
A record number of 97 million Americans have already voted by mail on November 3, before the polls open on Election Day itself. Although the polls gave Joe Biden a small lead, it turns out, just like in 2016, to be a neck-and-neck race between the two presidential candidates. Everything depends on the so-called swing states, the states where there is no clear preference for a Republican or Democratic state. The swing state where the most electoral votes are distributed, Florida, goes to Donald Trump. Everything depends on the outcome in other large states. The final decision is still days away.
On November 6, Joe Biden appears to be ahead in the states of Pennsylvania, Georgia, Nevada and Arizona. Biden only needs to win two of these states to win the presidential election. In the meantime, Joe Biden and his running mate Kamala Harris continue to address supporters and say that they are confident that victory will be theirs. On Saturday, November 7, the moment has arrived, the state of Pennsylvania will be awarded to Joe Biden. Biden has thus obtained the necessary 270 electoral votes and it has become impossible for Donald Trump to be re-elected. After two ‘failed’ candidacies and eight years as vice president, the time has come in 2020: Joe Biden has been elected the 46th president of the United States. Senator Kamala Harris will become his vice president, making her the first woman ever to hold this office. Biden and Harris will be inaugurated as president and vice president on January 20, 2021.