Joe Biden VP pick: Previewing appearance with Kamala Harris in Delaware
Reporters Ryan Cormier and Meredith Newman talk about Joe Biden’s VP pick Kamala Harris, and the buzz around their upcoming joint appearances today
Ryan Cormier, Meredith Newman and Damian Giletto, Delaware News Journal
For such a small state, Delaware has played a significant role in history. The decision on two vice presidential picks was made in and near here in the past 16 years.
Eyes are now looking toward Philadelphia where Vice President Kamala Harris, whose campaign headquarters are in Wilmington, just 32 miles away, is expected to announce her running mate at or perhaps shortly before a scheduled rally on Tuesday.
But it wasn’t too long ago when the focus was on Delaware, twice, in August 2008, and again in August 2020, regarding the right hand of the future president of the United States.
When Democratic Party presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama asked then-Sen. Joe Biden in 2008 if he was interested in the vice presidency, Biden initially was hesitant, according to his sister, Valerie Biden Owens, in her 2022 memoir “Growing Up Biden.”
A senator since he was 30, Biden was the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee and didn’t have to report to anyone. Being No. 2 wasn’t a role he was ready to take.
What finally changed the then 65-year-old’s mind?
Biden’s mom, Owens wrote.
“We have the chance to elect the first African American as president, and you have to even think about it?” their mother told her elder son, according to Owens in her book. Catherine Eugenia “Jean” Finnegan Biden, who lived in a house on Biden’s property in Greenville, died at age 92 in 2010, a year after Biden took office.
There is often secrecy regarding the intense process of vetting vice presidential candidates, right down to code names, private planes and undisclosed hotel rendezvous. The choice also is important because it sets the tone of the presidential candidate and the political party’s course in the election.
In August 2008, Biden was selected for his experience and told Obama yes. But first, he had to have the approval of David Plouffe, Obama’s campaign manager, and David Axelrod, Obama’s chief campaign strategist, according to Owens’ book. They would travel to meet Biden in Delaware, but it had to be private.
Plouffe was no stranger to Delaware. He grew up in Wilmington, graduated from Saint Mark’s High School and the University of Delaware, and ran former Delaware Attorney General Charles M. Oberly’s unsuccessful campaign against Sen. William V. Roth. Plouffe was just named a senior adviser to Harris’ presidential campaign team.
Biden’s home off Barley Mill Road in Greenville was not considered since it was under constant media surveillance. Owens said it was decided the three men would meet at her home nearby, just across the state line in southern Chester County, Pennsylvania.
Plouffe and Axelrod, now a frequent political commentator on CNN, flew to New Castle County Airport. They were picked up by Biden’s late son, Beau, and his wife, Jill, who wore “baseball hats and sunglasses adding to the intrigue,” Owens wrote.
Biden already was at Owens’ house when they arrived and the men met in the early morning by the pool under an awning on the hot day for the private meeting.
Owens said she and her husband, Jack, wanted to take a photo of the table setting of empty soda glasses and the three chairs where Biden, Axelrod and Plouffe sat but they did not because they agreed to no pictures.
“In hindsight, that was silly. It would be nice to have that memento now,” Owens wrote.
The meeting went well. Text and email messages went out to Obama supporters at about 3 a.m. on Aug. 23, 2008, that Biden would be Obama’s running mate, though the news had leaked even earlier.
The News Journal’s editorial board noted Obama’s choice of Biden was a momentous occasion for Delaware.
“A nomination for vice president is quite an honor for the senator, and, by reflected glory, for our small state,” the editorial said.
“Sen. Biden now has a chance to influence American history the way no Delawarean has since 1801 when Rep. James A. Baynard chose principle over party by helping break an election deadlock and put Thomas Jefferson in the White House over Aaron Burr.”
Twelve years later, on Tuesday, Aug. 11, 2020, history would repeat itself in Delaware when Democratic presidential nominee Biden chose California Sen. Kamala Harris as his running mate.
At around 2:45 p.m., after a monthslong search, Biden sat at his laptop in Greenville and was about to reveal one of his biggest campaign decisions to the woman who would make history, according to USA TODAY.
“You ready to go to work?” Biden asked Harris on a Zoom call.
“Oh, my God. I am so ready to go to work,” Harris replied.
Less than two hours later, a text message to supporters announced Harris as the first Black woman and the first Asian American person on a major party’s presidential ticket, marking a historic moment for Delaware and the nation.
While she had been a political rival, Harris, a former attorney general in California, had known President Biden’s son Beau, who died in 2015, when he held the same role in Delaware. The connection may have helped seal the deal.
“I know how much Beau respected Kamala and her work. And that mattered a lot to me, to be honest with you as I made this decision,” Biden would say later.
Harris arrived from Washington, D.C., to Delaware at about 12:45 p.m. on Aug. 12, 2020, to meet with Biden at the Hotel du Pont in Wilmington, the site where Biden celebrated his first victory party as a senator in 1972. Biden asked his sister, Valerie, who had managed most of his campaigns, to join them for lunch.
The pandemic was at its height that rainy and steamy afternoon. The area also was still recovering from the aftermath of powerful tornadoes and storms that had knocked out electricity and sheared telephone poles and trees around Greenville, Hockessin and Centreville.
Harris and Biden later spoke at Greenville’s Alexis I. du Pont High School before a crowd of a few hundred people. There was little social distancing outside, but most people wore masks in and outside the building. Curtis Mayfield’s “Move on Up” played in the background and some in the crowd said they were excited at witnessing history.
“It is right here,” one person said. “When do we ever get the opportunity to be a part of something like this?”
It likely won’t be the last Delaware sees of Harris and possibly her still-unchosen running mate.
Announcement coming: Who is Kamala Harris’ running mate? A look at the candidates with VP pick expected soon
Still here: Delaware’s president may be out, but Kamala Harris’ campaign HQ will remain in Wilmington
While Biden has bowed out of the presidential race and endorsed Harris, his headquarters and staffers have been passed to her and remain at Wilmington’s Brandywine Building.
With the election about three months away and Plouffe, a Wilmington native, advising the Harris campaign, Delaware perhaps has yet another chance to witness history firsthand.
Small wonder, indeed.
This article includes information from News Journal reporter Ryan Cormier and News Journal archives.
Patricia Talorico has written about Delaware for more than 30 years. You can find her on Instagram, X and Facebook. Email ptalorico@delawareonline.com.
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Publish date : 2024-08-04 22:56:00
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