President Joe Biden is set to sing his final political song at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago on Monday.
The speech would be the culmination of a national political career spanning more than half a century.
A Delaware native and son of Scranton, Pennsylvania, his career was shaped by personal tragedy as much as by policy, but he also found himself at the center of multiple key moments in American history.
Biden was a senior member of the Senate before becoming vice president to the nation’s first Black president, and then assumed the vice presidency during one of the country’s darkest periods.
Here’s a timeline of President Joe Biden’s political career.
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Biden’s legacy: How a man no longer running and a master of soft politics met a tough end
1970: Biden wins his first election and becomes a county councilman.
Biden practiced law in Delaware before winning his first political election in 1970, when he won a seat on the New Castle County Council representing the 4th County Council District.
1972: Biden is elected to the U.S. Senate
Biden will defeat two-term Republican incumbent J. Caleb Boggs for a Senate seat he will have held for more than three decades. Biden was seen as unlikely to win the seat because he will reach the minimum age for senators between the election and taking the oath of office.
December 18, 1972: Biden’s first wife and daughter die in a car accident
Following Joe’s election victory, tragedy struck the young Biden family: Joe’s wife, Nelia, and one-year-old daughter, Naomi Biden, were killed in a car accident while Christmas shopping in 1972. His sons, Beau and Hunter, were seriously injured in the accident.
After the accident, Biden considered resigning from his recently won seat and even contemplated suicide.
“I went to the Delaware Memorial Bridge and thought about what it would be like to jump off and end it all,” Biden said in the CNN documentary, “but I never got in a car to do it, or even get that close.”
1987: Biden first runs for president
Biden first announced his candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination on June 9, 1987.
Biden was initially seen as the favorite but was hampered by a confused message and repeated accusations of plagiarism and exaggeration of his background.
Biden withdrew his candidacy on September 23, 1987, before participating in the primaries or caucuses for the 1988 nomination.
1991: Anita Hill hearings and Clarence Thomas confirmation
Biden served as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee during both Supreme Court confirmation hearings.
In 1988, Biden presided over the nomination of Robert Bork and was praised for conducting the hearings in a fair and humorous manner. Bork’s nomination was defeated in committee by a vote of 5–9 and in the Senate by a vote of 42–58. Biden voted against Bork both times.
Biden then oversaw the nomination hearings for Clarence Thomas in 1991. Thomas called Biden’s questions during the hearings “a peanut ball to the head” because they were often complex. After the hearings closed, Anita Hill accused Thomas of sexual misconduct in the workplace, and the hearings were reopened.
Hill testified before the committee on October 11, 1991. After the allegations were made public, but before Hill testified, Thomas’ nomination was rejected by a 7-7 vote in committee and passed by the full Senate 52-48. Biden voted against the nomination in the full Senate.
1994: Crime Bill
In 1994, Biden helped pass the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, known as the Crime Bill of 1994. The bill included an assault weapons ban, the Violence Against Women Act, and an expansion of the death penalty to federal crimes.
Biden called parts of the bill that impose disproportionate penalties on crack cocaine-related crimes “a huge mistake that was made” and said in a 2019 campaign speech that the bill “locked up an entire generation of Black Americans.”
2008: Presidential to Vice Presidential victory
Biden ran for president for the second time on January 7, 2007. During the presidential election, Biden’s famous remarks about Rudy Giuliani during a primary debate included, “The only things he mentions in a sentence are nouns, verbs, and 9/11.”
Biden advanced to the Iowa caucuses in the 2008 presidential election, finishing fifth. Biden withdrew from the race on January 3, 2008.
Biden was nominated by his former rival Barack Obama to be his running mate on August 30, 2008. The two won the White House, and Biden was inaugurated as vice president on January 20, 2009.
May 30, 2015: Beau Biden dies
Biden’s eldest son, Joseph Robinette “Beau” Biden III, died of brain cancer on May 30, 2015.
The death likely prevented Biden from running for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016.
“I’d be lying if I said I knew I was going to be president,” Biden said during an appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert in 2015. “In my opinion, you have no right to run for the presidency unless you’re prepared to give 110 percent.”
2020: A presidential election, a pandemic and a chaotic transition
Biden announced his candidacy for the Democratic nomination for the 2020 presidential election on April 25, 2019.
Biden trailed Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders early in the primary campaign but emerged as the front-runner after winning the South Carolina primary and garnering support from many candidates who dropped out after Super Tuesday.
The onset of the coronavirus pandemic upended the primary and general election, with Biden campaigning primarily over Zoom.
Biden defeated Trump 306 to 232 in the electoral votes. Trump has filed a series of lawsuits and pressured Republican state officials to try to overturn the results. Trump and Republican activists have attempted a scheme to replace the duly chosen slate of electors.
On January 6, 2021, supporters of the defeated president stormed the Capitol in an attempt to stop the electoral vote count and overthrow the elected government. The attempt failed, and Biden was declared the electoral winner in the early hours of January 7.
2021: Biden in the White House
Biden was sworn in on January 20, 2021.
As president, he oversaw the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, rejoined the Paris Agreement and introduced infrastructure and climate legislation.
Biden orchestrated the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan in 2021, which resulted in the deaths of 13 U.S. soldiers and at least 170 Afghan civilians. In 2022, as Russia launched attacks on Ukraine, Biden rallied NATO to defend Ukraine.
His landmark presidency began with the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade. Abortion rights became a central issue in the 2022 election cycle as Biden’s Democrats seized on the issue to blunt a predicted “red wave.”
2024: The president leaves office after his second term.
Biden began campaigning for a second term on April 25, 2023.
Though Biden is only three years older than his rival, Donald Trump, questions about his mental and physical fitness dogged the campaign. According to a Media Matters for America investigation, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal ran a combined 76 articles about Biden’s age and seven about Donald Trump’s age between January 15 and June 17.
Concerns about Biden’s health were heightened after he appeared lethargic and made multiple gaffes during the first presidential debate on June 27. In the aftermath of the debate and his announcement on July 17 that he had COVID-19, speculation swirled that the president would withdraw as the presumptive Democratic nominee.
Biden dropped out of the race on July 21 and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris.
