Biography of Joe Biden, 46th President of the United States

Joe Biden (born Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. on Nov. 20, 1942) is an American politician who represented Delaware in the U.S. Senate from 1973 to 2009 before serving as vice president of the United States from 2009 to 2017 under Barack Obama. After unsuccessfully seeking the Democratic Party's nomination to run for president in 1988 and 2008, he became the party's nominee in the 2020 election and defeated incumbent Donald Trump in the November 2020 election, becoming the 46th president of the United States with a term beginning in January 2021.

During his 36-years in the Senate, Biden’s signature legislative accomplishment was the Violence Against Women Act of 1994, which stepped up prosecution of domestic and sexual violence and provided enhanced support services for victims. Biden is also known for both his oddball sense of humor and his stoic endurance of the tragic deaths of his first wife and two of his children.

Early Life

Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, on Nov. 20, 1942, the oldest of four children to Joseph Robinette Biden Sr., a down-on-his-luck used-car salesman, and Catherine Eugenia Finnegan Biden, who was so protective of her firstborn that she told the would-be vice president at a young age: "No one is better than you. Everyone is your equal, and everyone is equal to you."

Biden, writing in his autobiography Promises to Keep: On Life and Politics, said his mother confronted a seventh-grade nun at the Catholic prep school Archmere Academy who mocked her son for stuttering. "If you ever speak to my son like that again, I'll come back and rip that bonnet off your head. Do you understand me?" Biden recalled of his mother.

Biden's parents moved the family from northern Pennsylvania to Claymont, Delaware, in 1953. He graduated from Archmere Academy in 1961 and entered the University of Delaware. He graduated in 1965 with a double major in political science and history and entered the Syracuse University School of Law.

Family Tragedy Ends First Marriage

Biden got married in August 1966, before graduating from law school. He had met his first wife, Neilia Hunter, during spring break in the Bahamas. Biden earned his law degree in 1968 and began work as a public defender in Wilmington, Delaware. He also launched his career in politics, winning a seat on the New Castle Town Council at age 28. But he had much greater aspirations.

Biden took on his home-state senator, Republican J. Caleb Boggs, in the 1972 election and won, making him one of the youngest people to win election to the U.S. Senate, at age 29. The following month, Biden's wife and infant daughter Amy were killed when a tractor-trailer struck their station wagon in Hockessin, Delaware. Two other children, Hunter and Beau, were seriously injured but survived. (Beau Biden died at age 46 in 2015 from a rare form of brain cancer.)

Biden nearly gave up his political career after the deaths of his wife and daughter but decided instead to take his seat in Washington, D.C.—and return home to Wilmington on the train almost every night after working in the Senate.

"I did it because I wanted to be able to kiss them goodnight and kiss them in the morning the next day. ... I came to realize that a child can hold an important thought, something they want to say to their mom and dad, maybe for 12 or 24 hours, and then it’s gone. And when it’s gone, it’s gone. And it all adds up. But looking back on it, the truth be told, the real reason I went home every night was that I needed my children more than they needed me."

Complicated Legacy in the Senate

Biden's most significant legislative achievement was President Bill Clinton's signature in 1994 on the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, which included the Violence Against Women Act authored by the senator in 1990. The law provided more services for victims of abuse, doubled penalties for repeat sex offenders, and allowed for the prosecution of stalking. Biden has credited the measures for leading to a steep decline in domestic violence.

But that same legislation has since come under fire from advocates seeking to reform the criminal justice system, who point to the law's significant negative consequences—mass incarcerations, particularly among the African-American population. The 1994 law targeted gangs, spent nearly $10 billion on new prisons, and slapped repeat violent offenders with life sentences.

Biden also came under fire as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee for his handling of the 1991 confirmation hearings for U.S. Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas. Thomas had been accused by law professor Anita Hill of inappropriate sexual behavior, and Biden endured strong criticism for his failure to stop Thomas supporters from attacking her during her testimony. "To this day I regret I couldn't come up with a way to get her the kind of hearing she deserved, given the courage she showed by reaching out to us," Biden said in 2019. "She paid a terrible price—she was abused through the hearing, she was taken advantage of, her reputation was attacked. I wish I could've done something."

Biden has also been portrayed by critics as being in the pocket of the financial services industry and credit card companies, many of whom have headquarters in Wilmington, Delaware. One of those companies, MBNA, had been Biden's largest campaign contributor, and Biden had been supportive of legislation that made it more difficult for borrowers to claim certain protections when filing bankruptcy. Meanwhile, he was portrayed as too cozy with wealthy bankers; he once said about the faltering economy: “I don’t think 500 billionaires are the reason we’re in trouble. I get into a lot of trouble with my party when I say that wealthy Americans are just as patriotic as poor folks.”

Campaigns for President Derailed

Biden twice sought the Democratic presidential nomination, and he failed both times. The first attempt, in 1987, ended in a "train wreck," as he put it, after he was accused of plagiarism. Biden was forced to publicly acknowledge plagiarizing another author's work. He said he "used five pages from a published law review article without quotation or attribution" in a paper he claimed to have written as a first-year student at the Syracuse University College of Law, according to a faculty report on the incident issued at the time. Biden quit the race.

Biden launched his second bid for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2007. The crowded field of candidates included U.S. Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, the former first lady. Biden dropped out of the race in January 2008 after placing fifth in the Iowa caucuses.

Obama's Running Mate and Vice President

Obama tapped Biden to be his running mate in August 2008, a move that helped the inexperienced senator from Illinois win the presidency. Biden was seen as the wise elder statesman, a stark contrast to the inexperienced Republican vice presidential nominee that year, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

Obama won the election and served two terms in office. Biden served as his vice president all eight years. The former senator from Delaware became Obama's most trusted adviser and helped the president form his administration's position in support of same-sex marriage, among many other key issues.

2020 Presidential Race

After serving as vice president, Biden remained active in politics, often as a critic of President Donald Trump. Despite being accused of acts of unwanted touching by seven women during 2019, his popularity remained high, as did speculation that he would make his third run for the presidency in 2020. In April 2019, Biden announced his candidacy among an already crowded field of Democratic hopefuls.

By early March, most other candidates had bowed out, bringing the nomination to a two-man race between Biden and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders. Registering sizable wins in the primary elections, Biden soon took a commanding lead in convention delegates. Sanders withdrew from the race in April, leaving Biden as the presumptive Democratic nominee.

On August 11, 2020, Biden named California Senator Kamala Harris as his vice-presidential running mate, making her the first African American woman to appear on a major party’s national election ticket. On August 20, Biden officially accepted the Democratic presidential nomination. 

Biden faced off against Trump in the general election on November 3, 2020. The election saw an unprecedented number of early and mail-in votes, as Americans made their voices heard no matter what: over 159 million Americans voted, with over 66% of the voting-eligible population casting a ballot.

After a few days' lag time while all the votes were counted, Biden was officially projected as the winner on November 7. He ultimately won over 81 million votes (51.3% of votes cast) to Trump's 74 million (46.8%) and won the Electoral College by 306 votes to 232 - coincidentally, the same Electoral College margin that Trump won by in 2016. Following Biden's declared victory, there were a slew of lawsuits, conspiracy theories, and other attempts by Trump and his Republican allies to claim massive voter fraud and attempt to overturn the results of the election, but they were unsuccessful.

Updated by Robert Longley 

Sources

• “Vice President Joe Biden.” National Archives and Records Administration, National Archives and Records Administration, obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/vp.
• Broder, John M. “Father's Tough Life an Inspiration for Biden.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 23 Oct. 2008, www.nytimes.com/2008/10/24/us/politics/24biden.html.
• Dart, Bob. “Bidens Met, Forged Life Together after Tragedy.” OrlandoSentinel.com, 12 Oct. 2018, www.orlandosentinel.com/news/os-xpm-2008-10-24-a3bidenwife24-story.html.