Joe Biden: A Life of Trial and Redemption

by Jules Witcover, Jason Culp (Read by)

Overview

UPDATED AND WITH NEW PHOTOS

Newly updated, the definitive biography of the President-elect of the United States, Joe Biden, which examines the fascinating life of a man who has shaped Washington politics for more than four decades and will now enter the White House as President in his own right.

Raised in the working-class towns of Scranton, Pennsylvania, and Wilmington, Delaware, and with lackluster grades in school and no particular goals, Joe Biden shocked the nation in 1972 when he became one of the youngest elected senators in U.S. history. Over the course of four decades, he carved a legacy for himself as one of the most respected legislators in the country, and was a close friend and partner to President Barack Obama, who valued his vice president’s vast experience in domestic and foreign affairs.

Yet Biden's political success has been matched by personal tragedy and countless challenges. Within two months of being elected in 1972, Biden lost his wife, Neilia, and his young daughter in a tragic accident—a loss that brought him to the nadir of despair and shook his resolve to stay in politics. He suffered two brain aneurysms and career-threatening gaffes and miscues. In 2015, he lost his eldest son, Beau, to brain cancer. 

Biden then faced the biggest challenge of his political career as the Democratic nominee for the 2020 elections and won both the electoral college and popular vote. He is now poised to enter the White House once more—this time as President—at a time of great global uncertainty. Based on exhaustive research by one of Washington's most prolific journalists, including numerous exclusive interviews with Biden's confidants and family members, as well as President Obama and the President-elect himself, Joe Biden goes beyond conventional biography to track the forces that have shaped the man who will be the next President of the United States.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781094068077
Publisher:	HarperCollins Publishers
Publication date:	09/24/2019
Edition description:	Unabridged
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 5.50(h) x 1.80(d)

About the Author

Jules Witcover has been writing from Washington on politics and history since 1954, first for the Newhouse Newspapers, then the Los Angeles Times, Washington Post and Star and Baltimore Sun, and his column is syndicated by the [Chicago] Tribune Company. His twenty books include 85 Days: The Last Campaign of Robert Kennedy, The American Vice Presidency: From Irrelevance to Power, The Resurrection of Richard Nixon, The Year the Dream Died: Revisitng 1968 in America, accounts of the presidential elections from 1976 through 1992, and biographies of Vice Presidents Spiro Agnew and Joe Biden. 

Table of Contents

Prologue 1

1 Scranton 4

2 Wilmington 18

3 Building a Dream 29

4 The Making of a Politician 47

5 David and Goliath 72

6 The Dream Shattered 91

7 A Fresh Start 101

8 Finding Himself, and Jill 116

9 Civil Rights, Jimmy Carter, and Reelection 132

10 Moving on to the National Stage 143

11 Joe Biden for President 157

12 A Judicial Intrusion 170

13 Debacle in Iowa 186

14 Concentrating on Bork 197

15 A Costly Victory 219

16 Down but Not Out 233

17 Holding Out for Peace 248

18 Clarence and Anita 255

19 In Search of Truth and Fairness 269

20 Cozy Corporate Capital of America 290

21 Fighting Crime and Abuses of Power 303

22 Senate Globe-trotter 317

23 Wars of Necessity and Choice 334

24 Reassessing a Quagmire 355

25 Biden for President Again 372

26 A Questionable Prize 394

27 An Offer He Couldn't Refuse 404

28 Vice President Biden 435

29 The Second Obama Term 478

30 The Decision to Run a Third Time 490

Epilogue: Fulfilling the Promise 500

Acknowledgments 507

Notes 511

Bibliography 543

Index 549

Editorial Reviews

…a celebratory recitation of the major private and public moments of the vice president's life. Biden's rich and sometimes controversial career mirrors the policy achievements and political failures of the Democratic Party in modern times, and Joe Biden can also be read as a meditation on his party's troubled and occasionally triumphant trajectory since the 1960s.
—The Washington Post

Matthew Dallek

Veteran political commentator Witcover (Very Strange Bedfellows: The Short and Unhappy Marriage of Nixon & Agnew) chronicles Vice President Joe Biden's growth as a political operative, his personal tragedies and political triumphs, his mistakes, and his disappointments. The biography stretches from his childhood, unlikely 1972 senatorial election, presidential campaigns, and work on the Senate Judiciary and Foreign Relations committees, through his first year as Vice President. The book relies heavily on excerpts from speeches, interviews, and books by Biden (notably, Promises To Keep: On Life and Politics), plus family members, friends, and political associates, as it traces Biden's efforts to redeem himself and refute the perception that he is glib, gaffe-prone, ambitious, hotheaded, long-winded, dishonest, and superficial. Witcover repeatedly acknowledges but excuses Biden's shortcomings as both failings as well as assets, presenting him as an independently minded person of integrity, honor, family devotion, and chutzpah; a champion of civil rights, women's issues, and law enforcement; a shrewd foreign affairs expert; and a dedicated, experienced, and vital participant in the Obama administration.Verdict This first Biden biography will appeal to political enthusiasts. Recommended for public and undergraduate collections. [See Prepub Exploded, 5/20/10.]—Margaret Kappanadze, Elmira Coll. Lib., NY

Library Journal