Joe Biden Born: America's Future 46th President

Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. served thirty-six years in the United States Senate, eight years as Vice President, and won the 2020 presidential election at age seventy-seven, becoming the oldest person ever inaugurated as President. His political career spanned from the Vietnam era to the COVID-19 pandemic, a duration matched by few figures in American history. Born in Scranton, Pennsylvania on November 20, 1942, Biden grew up in a middle-class Irish-Catholic family and moved to Delaware as a child. He graduated from the University of Delaware and Syracuse University Law School. He was elected to the Senate from Delaware in 1972 at twenty-nine, one of the youngest senators in American history. Weeks after his election, his first wife Neilia and their one-year-old daughter Naomi were killed in a car accident. His two sons, Beau and Hunter, were injured but survived. He was sworn into office at their hospital bedside. He commuted daily by Amtrak between Wilmington and Washington for thirty-six years, a routine that became central to his political identity. He chaired the Senate Judiciary Committee during the contentious confirmation hearings for Robert Bork and Clarence Thomas, and chaired the Senate Foreign Relations Committee during the leadup to the Iraq War. He voted to authorize the use of force in Iraq, a decision he later called a mistake. He ran for president in 1988 and 2008, failing both times, before Barack Obama selected him as vice president in 2008. He served two terms as a steady, experienced counterpart to the younger Obama. His son Beau, the attorney general of Delaware and a veteran of the Iraq War, died of brain cancer in 2015 at forty-six. Biden decided not to run for president that year. He ran in 2020, defeating Donald Trump amid the pandemic. His administration oversaw the largest infrastructure investment in American history, the Inflation Reduction Act's climate provisions, and the withdrawal from Afghanistan. He announced he would not seek reelection in 2024, endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris.