People alongside Joe Biden – This is the new First Family

“Train Joe” and his endless supply

Joe Biden President-elect of the United States, he is a family man. “I wouldn’t be here without the love and tireless support of Jill, Hunter, Ashley and all of our grandchildren, their partners and our entire family,” he said in his first speech after his election victory. He didn’t mention the two shepherd dogs Major and Champ, who will move to the White House as First Dogs. The history of Biden’s family is marked by strokes of luck. At the age of 30, he lost his first wife, Neilia, and their 13-month-old daughter, Naomi, in a car accident, and both children were seriously injured. He was sworn in as a senator from Delaware at the children’s bedside. The eldest son, Beau, died of a brain tumor in 2015. For 36 years, Biden traveled by train daily from Wilmington, Delaware, to Washington DC to be in close contact with his family, which earned him the nickname by “Amtrak Joe”. The future president of the United States is known for mentioning his parents, grandparents or even more distant ancestors in speeches (“My father / mother / grandfather / … had an expression”). The Washington Post once wrote: “Biden has an endless supply of family quotes that he can pull off like a long strand of Irish thread at any time.”

He thought, “Oh God, this will never be anything”

Jill Biden, 69, the future first lady, met her husband on a blind date in 1975, arranged by Biden’s brother. Jill Jacobs, as she was then called, was a college student and recently divorced her first husband, a college footballer whom she married when she was 19. “Joe walked in the door wearing a sports coat and slippers,” he once told Vogue, “and I thought, oh God, this is never going to happen, not a million years from now.” Two years later, the couple married after Jill initially turned down four marriage proposals because: “For the sake of her children, I wanted to be one hundred percent sure.” After marriage she temporarily gave up her job as an English teacher to take care of the boys they called “Mama” and later her daughter Ashley, born in 1981. The doctoral teacher will be the first woman to keep her original job: Jill Biden is determined to continue teaching at Northern Virginia Community College. Click here for a detailed portrait of Jill Biden.

The man for complicated cases

Hunter Biden, 50, US lawyer, business lobbyist and self-proclaimed artist, his real name is Robert. His nickname Hunter is his mother Neilia’s maiden name. He repeatedly worried his father, for a long time he struggled with his addiction to alcohol and cocaine, and went to rehabilitation clinics several times. “Like everyone else I know, I fell and got up,” he said in an interview with ABC. “I’ve done things of value and things I regret.” His position on the board of directors of a Ukrainian gas company led to his father being charged with corruption and Donald Trump was impeached. Hunter Biden’s relationship life is full of tangles. In 2015 he separated from his wife Kathleen, the mother of his three daughters, only to find himself with his brother Beau’s widow. In 2018, a stripper gave birth to a son after a Hunter Biden DNA test recognized paternity. In May 2019, he married South African Melissa Cohen, just six days after their meeting. Joe Biden thanked his new daughter-in-law for “giving my son the courage to love again”. The couple have an eight-month-old son.

Fighter for another world

Ashley Blazer Biden, 39, a US social worker and designated First Daughter, was a politician as a child. “It’s in my genes,” he once said in a glamorous interview, according to his father, “he’s been trying to change the world since he was three.” When she found out that her favorite lip gloss had been tested on animals, she convinced her classmates to write protest letters to the company. He has also worked to protect dolphins from getting entangled in tuna nets. Later, after studying cultural anthropology, her focus shifted to children from disadvantaged educational backgrounds, women in prisons, and people after their release from prison. In 2017, two years after his brother Beau died, he founded the Livelihood sweatshirt label as a tribute to him, and the proceeds go to social projects. Ashley Biden has been married to plastic surgeon Howard Kerin since 2012. She prefers to keep her private life private: her Instagram profile is not public.

You know Biden’s passion – and a Trump

Naomi, Finnegan, Maisy, Natalie and Hunter Biden, Grandchildren of the president-elect of the United States, call their grandfather “Pop”. Naomi, 26, Hunter Biden’s eldest daughter, said during the campaign that Joe Biden was gnawing ice cream straight from the package, much to Jill Biden’s chagrin. Naomi is friends with Tiffany, Donald Trump’s daughter, with whom she studied at the University of Pennsylvania. His younger sister Maisy, 18, is friends with Sasha Obama; Nothing is known of the special friendships of middle sister Finnegan, 20. The three sisters have two stepbrothers in their early childhood who are not yet in public. Natalie, 16, Beau Biden’s eldest daughter, declared her grandmother “naughty” in an election campaign, Jill Biden likes to play pranks and sometimes pick up dead snakes to scare her husband. Natalie’s brother Robert Hunter, 14, has the same name as his uncle, which is why he is also called Robert Hunter Biden II.

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Published: 11/10/2020, 8:03 pm