Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. is an American politician who is the 46th and current president of the United States. A member of the Democratic Party, he previously served as the 47th vice president from 2009 to 2017 under President Barack Obama, and represented Delaware in the United States Senate from 1973 to 2009.
Born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, Biden moved with his family to Delaware in 1953. He studied at the University of Delaware before earning his law degree from Syracuse University. He was elected to the New Castle County Council in 1970 and became the sixth-youngest senator in U.S. history after he was elected to the United States Senate from Delaware in 1972, at age 29. Biden was the chair or ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for 12 years. He chaired the Senate Judiciary Committee from 1987 to 1995; led the effort to pass the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act and the Violence Against Women Act; and oversaw six U.S. Supreme Court confirmation hearings, including the contentious hearings for Robert Bork and Clarence Thomas.
Biden ran unsuccessfully for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1988 and 2008. Barack Obama chose Biden as his running mate in the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections. During his two terms as Obama's vice president, Biden frequently represented the administration in negotiations with congressional Republicans and was a close counselor to Obama. Biden and his running mate, Kamala Harris, defeated incumbents Donald Trump and Mike Pence in the 2020 presidential election. On January 20, 2021, he became the oldest president in U.S. history, the first to have a female vice president and the first president from Delaware.
As president, Biden has addressed the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent recession. He signed the American Rescue Plan Act, the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the Inflation Reduction Act, and the Respect for Marriage Act, which codified protections for same-sex marriage and repealed DOMA. He appointed Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court. In foreign policy, Biden restored America's membership in the Paris Agreement on climate change. He completed the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan that had been negotiated and begununder the previous administration, ending the war in Afghanistan, during which the Afghan government collapsed and the Taliban seized control. He responded to the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine by imposing sanctions on Russia and authorizing foreign aid and weapons shipments to Ukraine. Biden began his term with over 50% approval ratings; however, these fell significantly after the country experienced high inflation and gas prices. It later rose following Biden's legislative victories in August 2022.
Early life[]
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. was born on November 20, 1942, at St. Mary's Hospital in Scranton, Pennsylvania, to Catherine Eugenia "Jean" Biden (née Finnegan) and Joseph Robinette Biden Sr. The oldest child in a Catholic family, he has a sister, Valerie, and two brothers, Francis and James. Jean was of Irish descent, while Joseph Sr. had English, Irish, and French Huguenotancestry. Biden's paternal line has been traced to stonemason William Biden, who was born in 1789 in Westbourne, England, and emigrated to Maryland in the United States by 1820.
Biden's father had been wealthy and the family purchased a home in the affluent Long Island suburb of Garden City in the fall of 1946, but he suffered business setbacks around the time Biden was seven years old, and for several years the family lived with Biden's maternal grandparents in Scranton. Scranton fell into economic decline during the 1950s and Biden's father could not find steady work. Beginning in 1953 when Biden was ten, the family lived in an apartment in Claymont, Delaware, before moving to a house in nearby Mayfield. Biden Sr. later became a successful used-car salesman, maintaining the family in a middle-class lifestyle.
At Archmere Academy in Claymont, Biden played baseball and was a standout halfback and wide receiver on the high school football team. Though a poor student, he was class president in his junior and senior years. He graduated in 1961. At the University of Delaware in Newark, Biden briefly played freshman football, and, as an unexceptional student, earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1965 with a double major in history and political science and a minor in English.
Biden has a stutter, which has improved since his early twenties. He says he reduced it by reciting poetry before a mirror, but some observers suggested it affected his performance in the 2020 Democratic Party presidential debates.
Marriages, law school, and early career (1966–1973)[]
On August 27, 1966, Biden married Neilia Hunter, a student at Syracuse University, after overcoming her parents' reluctance for her to wed a Roman Catholic. Their wedding was held in a Catholic church in Skaneateles, New York. They had three children: Joseph R. "Beau" Biden III, Robert Hunter Biden, and Naomi Christina "Amy" Biden.
In 1968, Biden earned a Juris Doctor from Syracuse University College of Law, ranked 76th in his class of 85, after failing a course due to an acknowledged "mistake" when he plagiarized a law review article for a paper he wrote in his first year at law school. He was admitted to the Delaware bar in 1969.
Biden had not openly supported or opposed the Vietnam War until he ran for Senate and opposed Nixon's conduct of the war. While studying at the University of Delaware and Syracuse University, Biden obtained five student draft deferments, at a time when most draftees were sent to the Vietnam War. In 1968, based on a physical examination, he was given a conditional medical deferment; in 2008, a spokesperson for Biden said his having had "asthma as a teenager" was the reason for the deferment.
In 1968, Biden clerked at a Wilmington law firm headed by prominent local Republican William Prickett and, he later said, "thought of myself as a Republican". He disliked incumbent Democratic Delaware governor Charles L. Terry's conservative racial politics and supported a more liberal Republican, Russell W. Peterson, who defeated Terry in 1968. Biden was recruited by local Republicans but registered as an Independent because of his distaste for Republican presidential candidate Richard Nixon.
In 1969, Biden practiced law, first as a public defender and then at a firm headed by a locally active Democrat who named him to the Democratic Forum, a group trying to reform and revitalize the state party; Biden subsequently reregistered as a Democrat. He and another attorney also formed a law firm. Corporate law, however, did not appeal to him, and criminal law did not pay well.He supplemented his income by managing properties.
In 1970, Biden ran for the 4th district seat on the New Castle County Council on a liberal platform that included support for public housing in the suburbs. The seat had been held by Republican Henry R. Folsom, who was running in the 5th District following a reapportionment of council districts. Biden won the general election by defeating Republican Lawrence T. Messick, and took office on January 5, 1971. He served until January 1, 1973, and was succeeded by Democrat Francis R. Swift. During his time on the county council, Biden opposed large highway projects, which he argued might disrupt Wilmington neighborhoods.
1972 U.S. Senate campaign in Delaware[]
In 1972, Biden defeated Republican incumbent J. Caleb Boggs to become the junior U.S. senator from Delaware. He was the only Democrat willing to challenge Boggs, and with minimal campaign funds, he was given no chance of winning. Family members managed and staffed the campaign, which relied on meeting voters face-to-face and hand-distributing position papers, an approach made feasible by Delaware's small size. He received help from the AFL–CIO and Democratic pollster Patrick Caddell. His platform focused on the environment, withdrawal from Vietnam, civil rights, mass transit, equitable taxation, health care, and public dissatisfaction with "politics as usual". A few months before the election, Biden trailed Boggs by almost thirty percentage points, but his energy, attractive young family, and ability to connect with voters' emotions worked to his advantage and he won with 50.5 percent of the vote. At the time of his election, he was 29 years old, but he reached the constitutionally required age of 30 before he was sworn in as Senator.
Death of wife and daughter[]
On December 18, 1972, a few weeks after Biden was elected senator, his wife Neilia and one-year-old daughter Naomi were killed in an automobile accident while Christmas shopping in Hockessin, Delaware. Neilia's station wagon was hit by a semi-trailer truck as she pulled out from an intersection. Their sons Beau (aged 3) and Hunter (aged 2) were taken to the hospital in fair condition, Beau with a broken leg and other wounds and Hunter with a minor skull fracture and other head injuries. Biden considered resigning to care for them, but Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfieldpersuaded him not to.
Years later, Biden said he believed the truck driver had been drinking before the crash, but was never charged, and the driver's family said the deaths haunted him until he died in 1999. Biden later apologized to the driver's family. The accident filled Biden with anger and religious doubt. He wrote that he "felt God had played a horrible trick" on him, and he had trouble focusing on work.
Second marriage[]
Biden met the teacher Jill Tracy Jacobs in 1975 on a blind date. They married at the United Nations chapel in New York on June 17, 1977. They spent their honeymoon at Lake Balaton in the Hungarian People's Republic. Biden credits her with the renewal of his interest in politics and life. They are Roman Catholics and attend Mass at St. Joseph's on the Brandywine in Greenville, Delaware. Their daughter Ashley Biden is a social worker. She is married to physician Howard Krein. Beau Biden became an Army Judge Advocate in Iraq and later Delaware Attorney General before dying of brain cancer in 2015. Hunter Biden is a Washington lobbyist and investment adviser.
Teaching[]
From 1991 to 2008, as an adjunct professor, Biden co-taught a seminar on constitutional law at Widener University School of Law. The seminar often had a waiting list. Biden sometimes flew back from overseas to teach the class.
U.S. Senate (1973–2009)[]
Biden served in the United States Senate from 1973 to 2009. A member of the Democratic Party from the state of Delaware, Biden was first elected to the Senate in 1972, and was sworn into office at the age of 30; he was later re-elected six times. He is Delaware's longest-serving U.S. senator.
As a city councilor, Biden ran against incumbent Republican J. Caleb Boggs, after facing no Democratic rivals. With a small-scale family-run campaign, his young energy and voter connectivity prevailed. After Biden was elected, his wife and infant daughter died in an car accident. Biden was persuaded not to resign and commuted to Delaware throughout his Senate career to care for his two sons, Beau and Hunter, both of whom had survived the crash. He married Jill Tracy Jacobs in 1977; their daughter Ashley was born in 1981.
During his early years in the Senate, Biden focused on consumer protection and the environment. He played a key role in passing the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, which was controversial for several "tough-on-crime" provisions. He later expressed regret over this. Biden voted to ban homosexuals from serving in the military and to bar the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages. He championed arms control concerning the SALT treaties. He clashed with the Reagan Administration over its support for Apartheid-era South Africa. He was a leading opponent of mandatory desegregation busing. In 1987, Biden ran for president, but withdrew due to incidents of plagiarism coming to light. The following year, Biden received brain surgery after suffering aneurysms.
As chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Biden presided over the contentious Supreme Court nominations of Robert Bork and Clarence Thomas. Biden voiced opposition to Bork's originalism. During the Thomas hearings, Biden's style was criticized and Thomas felt his questions were meant to damage him. Biden disclosed Anita Hill's allegations of sexual harassment to the rest of the Committee, but not the public. Later he refused other witnesses to be heard. Biden also opposed his confirmation. Later he expressed regret to Hill. He spearheaded the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994. Biden was critical of the actions of Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr during the 1990s Whitewater controversy and Lewinsky scandal investigations and voted to acquit on both charges during the impeachment of President Bill Clinton.
Concerning foreign policy Biden was generally a liberal internationalist, collaborating with Republicans and sometimes opposing fellow Democrats. He voted against authorizing the First Gulf War, saying the US was bearing almost all the burden in the anti-Iraq coalition. He was strongly involved with policy towards the Yugoslav Wars. He supported the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. As chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee he assembled witnesses who grossly misrepresented Saddam Hussein, his government and claimed possession of WMDs. Later he regretted his support for the Iraq War. Biden supported military installations in Delaware and Amtrak, which he used to commute. He supported bankruptcy legislation sought by a Delaware company, in opposition to leading Democrats and consumer rights organisations. He was one of the least wealthy members of the Senate, and was known for his gaffes.
Presidential campaigns of 1988 and 2008[]
1988 campaign[]
Biden formally declared his candidacy for the 1988 Democratic presidential nomination on June 9, 1987. He was considered a strong candidate because of his moderate image, his speaking ability, his high profile as chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee at the upcoming Robert Bork Supreme Court nomination hearings, and his appeal to Baby Boomers; he would have been the second-youngest person elected president, after John F. Kennedy. He raised more in the first quarter of 1987 than any other candidate.
By August his campaign's messaging had become confused due to staff rivalries, and in September, he was accused of plagiarising a speech by British Labour Party leader Neil Kinnock. Biden's speech had similar lines about being the first person in his family to attend university. Biden had credited Kinnock with the formulation on previous occasions, but did not on two occasions in late August. Kinnock himself was more forgiving; the two men met in 1988, forming an enduring friendship.
Earlier that year he had used passages from a 1967 speech by Robert F. Kennedy (for which his aides took blame) and a short phrase from John F. Kennedy's inaugural address; two years earlier he had used a 1976 passage by Hubert Humphrey. Biden responded that politicians often borrow from one another without giving credit, and that one of his rivals for the nomination, Jesse Jackson, had called him to point out that he (Jackson) had used the same material by Humphrey that Biden had used.
A few days later, an incident in law school in which Biden drew text from a Fordham Law Review article with inadequate citations was publicized. He was required to repeat the course and passed with high marks. At Biden's request the Delaware Supreme Court's Board of Professional Responsibility reviewed the incident and concluded that he had violated no rules.
Biden has made several false or exaggerated claims about his early life: that he had earned three degrees in college, that he attended law school on a full scholarship, that he had graduated in the top half of his class, and that he had marched in the civil rights movement. The limited amount of other news about the presidential race amplified these disclosures and on September 23, 1987, Biden withdrew his candidacy, saying it had been overrun by "the exaggerated shadow" of his past mistakes.
2008 campaign[]
After exploring the possibility of a run in several previous cycles, in January 2007, Biden declared his candidacy in the 2008 elections. During his campaign, Biden focused on the Iraq War, his record as chairman of major Senate committees, and his foreign-policy experience. In mid-2007, Biden stressed his foreign policy expertise compared to Obama's. Biden was noted for his one-liners during the campaign; in one debate he said of Republican candidate Rudy Giuliani: "There's only three things he mentions in a sentence: a noun, and a verb and 9/11."
Biden had difficulty raising funds, struggled to draw people to his rallies, and failed to gain traction against the high-profile candidacies of Obama and Senator Hillary Clinton. He never rose above single digits in national polls of the Democratic candidates. In the first contest on January 3, 2008, Biden placed fifth in the Iowa caucuses, garnering slightly less than one percent of the state delegates. He withdrew from the race that evening.
Despite its lack of success, Biden's 2008 campaign raised his stature in the political world. In particular, it changed the relationship between Biden and Barack Obama. Although they had served together on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, they had not been close: Biden resented Obama's quick rise to political stardom, while Obama viewed Biden as garrulous and patronizing. Having gotten to know each other during 2007, Obama appreciated Biden's campaign style and appeal to working-class voters, and Biden said he became convinced Obama was "the real deal".
2008 vice-presidential campaign[]
Shortly after Biden withdrew from the presidential race, Obama privately told him he was interested in finding an important place for Biden in his administration. In early August, Obama and Biden met in secret to discuss the possibility, and developed a strong personal rapport. On August 22, 2008, Obama announced that Biden would be his running mate. The New York Times reported that the strategy behind the choice reflected a desire to fill out the ticket with someone with foreign policy and national security experience. Others pointed out Biden's appeal to middle-class and blue-collar voters. Biden was officially nominated for vice president on August 27 by voice vote at the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver.
Biden's vice-presidential campaigning gained little media attention, as the press devoted far more coverage to the Republican nominee, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. Under instructions from the campaign, Biden kept his speeches succinct and tried to avoid offhand remarks, such as one he made about Obama's being tested by a foreign power soon after taking office, which had attracted negative attention. Privately, Biden's remarks frustrated Obama. "How many times is Biden gonna say something stupid?" he asked. Obama campaign staffers called Biden's blunders "Joe bombs" and kept Biden uninformed about strategy discussions, which in turn irked Biden. Relations between the two campaigns became strained for a month, until Biden apologized on a call to Obama and the two built a stronger partnership. Publicly, Obama strategist David Axelrod said Biden's high popularity ratings had outweighed any unexpected comments.
As the financial crisis of 2007–2010 reached a peak with the liquidity crisis of September 2008 and the proposed bailout of the United States financial system became a major factor in the campaign, Biden voted for the $700 billion Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, which passed in the Senate, 74–25. On October 2, 2008, he participated in the vice-presidential debate with Palin at Washington University in St. Louis. Post-debate polls found that while Palin exceeded many voters' expectations, Biden had won the debate overall. Nationally, Biden had a 60% favorability rating in a Pew Research Center poll, compared to Palin's 44%. On November 4, 2008, Obama and Biden were elected with 53% of the popular vote and 365 electoral votes to McCain–Palin's 173.
At the same time Biden was running for vice president he was also running for reelection to the Senate, as permitted by Delaware law. On November 4, he was reelected to the Senate, defeating Republican Christine O'Donnell. Having won both races, Biden made a point of waiting to resign from the Senate until he was sworn in for his seventh term on January 6, 2009. Biden cast his last Senate vote on January 15, supporting the release of the second $350 billion for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, and resigned from the Senate later that day.
Vice presidency (2009–2017)[]
While Biden mostly served in the role of behind-the-scenes adviser to the president, he took particularly active roles in formulating federal policies relating to Iraq and Afghanistan. In 2010, the vice president used his well-established Senate connections to help secure passage of the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty between the United States and the Russian Federation.
Biden seemed to relish the opportunity to play a crucial role in the Obama Administration. Following the 2008 election, he said, "This is a historic moment. I started my career fighting for civil rights, and to be a part of what is both a moment in American history where the best people, the best ideas, the single best reflection of the American people can be called upon—to be at that moment, with a guy who has such incredible talent and who is also a breakthrough figure in multiple ways—I genuinely find that exciting. It's a new America. It's the reflection of a new America."
Running for re-election in 2012, the Obama-Biden team faced Republican challenger Mitt Romney, a former governor of Massachusetts, and Romney's vice-presidential running mate, U.S. Representative Paul Ryan of Wisconsin. Obama defeated Romney in the 2012 election, earning a second term as president and Biden another term as vice president. President Obama received nearly 60 percent of the electoral vote, and won the popular vote by more than 1 million ballots.
Later that year, Biden showed just how influential a vice president he could be. He was instrumental in achieving a bipartisan agreement on tax increases and spending cuts to avoid the fiscal cliff crisis. With a looming deadline, Biden was able to hammer out a deal with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. On January 1, 2013, the fiscal cliff bill passed in the Senate after months of tough negotiations. The House of Representatives approved it later that day.
Around this time, Biden also became a leading figure in the national debate about gun control. He was selected to head up a special task force on the issue after the school shooting at a Newtown, Connecticut elementary school that December. Biden delivered solutions for reducing gun violence across the nation to President Obama in January 2013. He helped craft 19 actions that the president could take on the issue using his power of executive order among other recommendations.
Biden has been married to his second wife, Jill Biden, since 1977. The couple's daughter, Ashley, was born in 1981. On May 30, 2015, Biden suffered another personal loss when his son Beau died at the age of 46. On January 12, 2017, President Obama presented Biden with the Presidential Medal of Freedom with distinction, the nation's highest civilian honor, in a surprise ceremony at the White House. Obama called Biden "the best vice president America's ever had" and a "lion of American history," and told him he was being honored for ‘‘faith in your fellow Americans, for your love of country and a lifetime of service that will endure through the generations.’’ Biden gave an emotional impromptu speech thanking the president, First Lady Michelle Obama, his wife Jill and his children.
Subsequent activities (2017–2019)[]
After leaving the vice presidency, Biden became an honorary professor at the University of Pennsylvania. Titled the "Benjamin Franklin Presidential Practice Professor", Biden led panel discussions on history and politics and developed the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement.He also continued to lead efforts to find treatments for cancer. In 2017, he wrote a memoir, Promise Me, Dad, and went on a book tour. Biden earned $15.6 million from 2017 to 2018. In 2018, he gave a eulogy for Senator John McCain, praising McCain's embrace of American ideals and bipartisan friendships. Biden was targeted by two pipe bombs that were mailed to him during the October 2018 mail bombing attempts, which targeted democratic lawmakers and critics of then President Trump. One device was noticed and identified as a bomb in New Castle, Delaware, due to insufficient postage and subsequent examination, while another was found at a Wilmington, Delaware, postal facility and intercepted there. The devices were later found to have been intentionally designed to not detonate.
Biden remained in the public eye, endorsing candidates while continuing to comment on politics, climate change, and the presidency of Donald Trump. He also continued to speak out in favor of LGBT rights, continuing advocacy on an issue he had become more closely associated with during his vice presidency. In 2019, Biden criticized Brunei for its intention to implement Islamic laws that would allow death by stoning for adultery and homosexuality, calling this "appalling and immoral" and saying, "There is no excuse—not culture, not tradition—for this kind of hate and inhumanity." By 2019, Biden and his wife reported that their assets had increased to between $2.2 million and $8 million from speaking engagements and a contract to write a set of books.
2020 presidential campaign[]
Speculation and announcement[]
Between 2016 and 2019, media outlets often mentioned Biden as a likely candidate for president in 2020. When asked if he would run, he gave varied and ambivalent answers, saying "never say never". At one point he suggested he did not see a scenario where he would run again, but a few days later, he said, "I'll run if I can walk." A political action committee known as Time for Biden was formed in January 2018, seeking Biden's entry into the race. He finally launched his campaign on April 25, 2019, saying he was prompted to run, among other reasons, by his "sense of duty."
Campaign[]
Throughout 2019, Biden stayed generally ahead of other Democrats in national polls. Despite this, he finished fourth in the Iowa caucuses, and eight days later, fifth in the New Hampshire primary. He performed better in the Nevada caucuses, reaching the 15% required for delegates, but still was behind Bernie Sanders by 21.6 percentage points. Making strong appeals to Black voters on the campaign trail and in the South Carolina debate, Biden won the South Carolina primary by more than 28 points. After the withdrawals and subsequent endorsements of candidates Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar, he made large gains in the March 3 Super Tuesday primary elections. Biden won 18 of the next 26 contests, including Alabama, Arkansas, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia, putting him in the lead overall. Elizabeth Warren and Mike Bloomberg soon dropped out, and Biden expanded his lead with victories over Sanders in four states (Idaho, Michigan, Mississippi, and Missouri) on March 10.
When Sanders suspended his campaign on April 8, 2020, Biden became the Democratic Party's presumptive nominee for president. On April 13, Sanders endorsed Biden in a live-streamed discussion from their homes. Former President Barack Obama endorsed Biden the next day. In March 2020, Biden committed to choosing a woman as his running mate. In June, Biden met the 1,991-delegate threshold needed to secure the party's presidential nomination. On August 11, he announced U.S. Senator Kamala Harris of California as his running mate, making her the first African American and first South Asian American vice-presidential nominee on a major-party ticket.
On August 18, 2020, Biden was officially nominated at the 2020 Democratic National Convention as the Democratic Party nominee for president in the 2020 election.
Presidential transition[]
Biden was elected the 46th president of the United States in November 2020. He defeated the incumbent, Donald Trump, becoming the first candidate to defeat a sitting president since Bill Clinton defeated George H. W. Bush in 1992. Trump refused to concede, insisting the election had been "stolen" from him through "voter fraud", challenging the results in court and promoting numerous conspiracy theories about the voting and vote-counting processes, in an attempt to overturn the election results. Biden's transition was delayed by several weeks as the White House ordered federal agencies not to cooperate. On November 23, General Services Administrator Emily W. Murphy formally recognized Biden as the apparent winner of the 2020 election and authorized the start of a transition process to the Biden administration.
On January 6, 2021, during Congress' electoral vote count, Trump told supporters gathered in front of the White House to march to the Capitol. Soon after, they attacked the Capitol. During the insurrection at the Capitol, Biden addressed the nation, calling the events "an unprecedented assault unlike anything we've seen in modern times." He specifically called on Trump to "go on national television now to fulfill his oath and defend the Constitution and demand an end to this siege", adding, "it must end now." After the Capitol was cleared, Congress resumed its joint session and officially certified the election results with Vice President Mike Pence, in his capacity as President of the Senate, declaring Biden and Harris the winners.
Presidency (2021–2025)[]
On January 20th 2021, Biden took office following his victory in the 2020 presidential election over Republican incumbent president Donald Trump. He was inaugurated alongside Kamala Harris, the first woman, first African American, and first Asian American vice president. Biden entered office amid the COVID-19 pandemic, an economic crisis, and increased political polarization.
On the first day of his presidency, Biden made an effort to revert President Trump's energy policy by restoring U.S. participation in the Paris Agreement and revoking the permit for the Keystone XL pipeline. He also halted funding for Trump's border wall, an expansion of the Mexican border wall. On his second day, he issued a series of executive orders to reduce the impact of COVID-19, including invoking the Defense Production Act of 1950, and set an early goal of achieving one hundred million COVID-19 vaccinations in the United States in his first 100 days.
Biden signed into law the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021; a $1.9 trillion stimulus bill that temporarily established expanded unemployment insurance and sent $1,400 stimulus checks to most Americans in response to continued economic pressure from COVID-19. He signed the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act; a ten-year plan brokered by Biden alongside Democrats and Republicans in Congress, to invest in American roads, bridges, public transit, ports and broadband access. He appointed Ketanji Brown Jackson, the first Black woman, to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court. Biden proposed a significant expansion of the U.S. social safety net through the Build Back Better Act, but those efforts, along with voting rights legislation, failed in Congress. However, in August 2022, Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, a domestic appropriations bill that included some of the provisions of the Build Back Better Act after the entire bill failed to pass. It included significant federal investment in climate and domestic clean energy production, tax credits for solar panels, electric cars and other home energy programs as well as a three-year extension of Affordable Care Act subsdies.
In foreign policy, Biden completed the withdrawal of U.S. military forces from Afghanistan, declaring an end to nation-building efforts and shifting U.S. foreign policy toward strategic competition with China and, to a lesser extent, Russia. However, during the withdrawal, the Afghan government collapsed and the Taliban seized control, leading to Biden receiving bipartisan criticism. He responded to the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine by imposing sanctions on Russia as well as providing Ukraine with over $10 billion in military aid as well as billions of dollars in economic and humanitarian aid. Biden also approved a raid which led to the death of Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi, the leader of the Islamic State and approving a drone strike which killed Ayman Al Zawahiri, leader of Al-Qaeda. On September 2, 2022, during the 2022 midterm elections, Biden called for a "battle for the soul of the nation" in a nationally broadcast Philadelphia speech. A predicted Republican wave election did not materialise and the race for U.S. Congress control was much closer than expected with the Republicans securing a slim majority of at least 218 seats in the House of Representatives as of November 16, and Democrats keeping control of the U.S. Senate, with at least 50 seats.
Political positions[]
Over his career, Biden has generally been regarded as belonging to the mainstream of the Democratic Party. Biden has been described as center to center-left and has described himself as such. Figures farther to the left such as Bernie Sanders have criticized Biden for not embracing Medicare for All or the Green New Deal. Biden's policies emphasise the needs of middle-class and working-class Americans and have drawn political support from those groups.
Biden has supported campaign finance reform including the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act and overturning Citizens United; the 1994 Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act; the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009; student tax credits; carbon emissions cap and trade; the increased infrastructure spending proposed by the Obama administration; mass transit; renewable energy subsidies; student loan forgiveness; and reversals of Republican tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations.
He supports building upon the Affordable Care Act through a public health insurance option instead of a single-payer system. He supports decriminalising cannabis at the federal level and the right for states to legalise it.
Biden has been publicly in favour of same-sex marriage since 2012 when he became the highest-ranking U.S. official to voice support for same-sex marriage, preempting Obama on the subject. He also supports the Roe v. Wade decision and since 2019 has been in favor of repealing the Hyde Amendment.
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