Joe Biden was elected in 1972 at age 29 to the US Senate from Delaware
Washington:
A pillar of American political life for decades, Joe Biden, 77, has seen many ups and downs during his long career in Washington. But in the end, he won the biggest award of all – the presidency – after beating President Donald Trump.
Senate at 30
Active in local Delaware politics, Biden scored a major surprise at the age of 30 by ousting a well-established Republican senator in the 1972 election.
A few weeks later, Biden’s wife and daughter died in a car crash. He considered resigning to care for his injured sons Beau and Hunter, but was persuaded to stay and was sworn in on January 5, 1973.
He was re-elected to the upper house of Congress continuously until 2008.
Against the “bus”
In the 1970s, he opposed a government policy known as the “bus,” which organized buses to transport black children to predominantly white schools in order to promote coeducation.
Senator Kamala Harris attacked him for his position in this year’s Democratic primary race. Nevertheless, he chose her as his running mate.
Presidential flop
In 1987, Biden joined the race for the White House for the first time, bolstered by his image as a dashing man in his forties and starting as a favorite among many in his party.
But he collapsed in a humiliating style after making a series of hype about his past and scandal over plagiarized passages in his campaign speeches.
Women and the law
As chairman of the powerful Senate Judiciary Committee, Biden oversaw the 1991 process of confirming Judge Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court when accusations of sexual harassment against the candidate emerged.
Biden set up a televised hearing for Thomas’ accuser Anita Hill, which turned into a fiasco. Hill, a young law professor, was grilled in graphic detail by an all-white, all-male panel in scenes that shocked many onlookers.
Biden later apologized. Three years later, he caught up by overseeing the passage of the Violence Against Women Act. He described it as his “proudest legislative achievement”.
Prison numbers
Biden was also a key architect of broader criminal justice reforms which drew much criticism.
At a time when crime ravaged sections of American society, legislation under President Bill Clinton signaled a consensus among rival political parties to take a tough approach.
The “criminal law” of 1994 is believed by some to be responsible for the explosion in the number of prisoners in the United States and also for the overrepresentation of African Americans in prison.
Its negative impact was in part due to the harsh punishment for crack users, a drug more often used in poor neighborhoods.
“It was a mistake,” Biden admitted during his last debate with Donald Trump.
Iraq war
When he was chairman of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee in 2002, Biden voted to support the war in Iraq, after holding hearings of numerous witnesses who suggested – wrongly – that Saddam Hussein’s regime possessed weapons. of massive destruction.
He again said his position was a mistake in hindsight.
Obama’s number two
Biden was chosen by Barack Obama as his running mate and entered the White House with him in January 2009, amid the global financial crisis.
Biden got Congress to pass a massive $ 800 billion stimulus package, which the president told him to implement.
The plan was widely viewed as a success as the US economy rebounded.
Biden may have run for president in 2016, but for the death of his oldest son Beau from a brain tumor. Obama and Biden have remained close allies.
White House Offer
In 2019, he launched his campaign to beat Donald Trump and finally win the White House.
After a rocky start, he rebounded to victory in the Democratic primary, bolstered by his support among African Americans, and became the party’s presidential candidate. In the end, after a campaign like no other, which took place amid the coronavirus pandemic, he denied Trump a second term.
(Except for the title, this story was not edited by GalacticGaming staff and is posted from a syndicated feed.)
