Jill Biden

Teacher

• Born: June 3, 1951
• Place of Birth: Hammonton, New Jersey

Significance: Jill Biden is an American educator who has taught reading and English at the high school and college levels since the 1970s. As the wife of former Vice President Joe Biden, Jill served as the Second Lady of the United States from 2009–2017. She became the First Lady of the United States when her husband was sworn in as president on January 20, 2021.

Background

Jill Biden was born Jill Jacobs on June 3, 1951, in the New Jersey town of Hammonton. She was one of five daughters born to Bonny and Donald Jacobs. Her father was a banker, while her mother chose to stay at home to raise her children. The Jacobs family later moved to Willow Grove, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Philadelphia, where Biden attended Upper Moreland High School. After graduating in 1969, Biden married then-boyfriend Bill Stevenson, and the pair attended the University of Delaware together. By her junior year, Biden’s marriage was nearing its end and the couple divorced.

In 1975, Biden went on a blind date with Joe Biden, then a young US senator from Delaware. Joe Biden’s wife and one-year-old daughter had been killed in a 1972 car accident and the senator was raising his two sons, Beau and Hunter, on his own. As the couple began dating, Jill Biden began growing attached to the two young boys. Joe Biden proposed to Jill five times before she accepted, admitting in later interviews that she wanted to be sure of her feelings before making such a commitment to the Biden family. Jill and Joe Biden were eventually married in 1977 at a ceremony at the United Nations building in New York City. According to Joe Biden’s autobiography, Beau and Hunter joined the couple at the altar as if “the four of us were getting married.”

Education Career and First Lady

After earning a bachelor’s degree in education in 1975, Jill Biden worked as a high school English teacher. After marrying, she also continued to teach and further her education. In 1981, Biden completed a master’s degree in reading from West Chester University; that same year, she gave birth to a daughter, Ashley. After taking a few years off to spend with her family, Biden decided to return to work. She also pursued another master’s degree, this time completing her studies in education from Villanova University in 1987.

During the 1980s, Biden taught English and reading to students at a psychiatric hospital. She later spent time teaching at several high schools, including Claymont High School in Claymont, Delaware, and Brandywine High School in Wilmington, Delaware. In 1993, she began a fifteen-year stint teaching English composition at Delaware Technical Community College.

In 2007, Biden earned a doctorate in education from the University of Delaware. A year later, her life was changed when Joe Biden was selected by the Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama as his vice presidential candidate.

After Obama won the presidency in 2008, Jill Biden became the Second Lady of the United States. The couple moved to Washington, DC, and Biden began teaching English at Northern Virginia Community College. According to some media reports, she was probably only the second Second Lady in US history to hold a paying job in the private sector while her husband served as vice president. As Second Lady, Biden worked with then-First Lady Michelle Obama on a project called Joining Forces, an effort to help returning veterans and their spouses find employment and educational opportunities. Biden also used her position to advocate for community colleges, sponsoring the White House Summit on Community Colleges in 2010.

As Joe Biden’s political career progressed, Jill Biden remained relatively out of the spotlight while still helping her husband campaign, a job she referred to as the “family business.” In 2020 Joe Biden won the Democratic nomination for president and squared off against President Donald Trump in that November’s election. During the 2020 Democratic National Convention (DNC), an event held virtually because of the global coronavirus pandemic, Jill Biden introduced her husband in a speech given from Brandywine High School, where she taught in the early 1990s. She continued to play a visible role in her husband’s campaign throughout the remainder of the election.

When Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election in November, Biden became the First Lady designate. She officially replaced Melania Trump as First Lady of the United States when Joe Biden was inaugurated on January 20, 2021.

After she became First Lady, Biden continued teaching at Northern Virginia Community College, but also took on a wide range of new duties as First Lady. She restarted the Joining Forces program, which had stopped when Trump was president, and gave speeches to support Democratic policies and politicians campaigning around the US.

Throughout 2021, Biden also spoke out on a number of issues; for example, she became a vocal advocate for vaccination against COVID-19. The Biden administration also tasked her with promoting President Biden’s “Build Back Better” plan, a proposed legislative agenda which included investments in green energy, free community college, and other social initiatives. While this legislation was only able to pass in a compromised form in August 2022 as the Inflation Reduction Act, Biden continued to press for greater federal support of community colleges.

As First Lady, Biden also frequently traveled abroad as a representative of the Biden administration. In a particularly high-profile foreign visit, Biden traveled to Romania and Slovakia in May 2022, visiting with Ukrainian families displaced by the Russian invasion of Ukraine earlier that year.

Impact

In 1993, four of Jill Biden’s friends were diagnosed with breast cancer, prompting her to begin an effort to combat the disease. She started the Biden Breast Health Initiative to provide free educational programs and cancer screenings to all school students and youth organizations in the state of Delaware. Since its inception, the initiative has educated tens of thousands of high school students on the benefits of early detection.

Biden is also a published author. She wrote a 2012 children’s book called Don’t Forget: God Bless Our Troops, about a little girl’s experience when her father leaves for military duty; her own autobiography, Where the Light Enters: Building a Family, Discovering Myself, in 2019; and the children’s book Joey: The Story of Joe Biden, based on Joe Biden’s childhood, in 2020.

As First Lady, Biden made history as the first president’s wife to hold a paying job in the private sector.

Personal Life

From the start of their relationship, Jill Biden considered Joe’s sons, Beau and Hunter, to be her own. Biden had a daughter with Joe, named Ashley, in 1981. Hunter became a lawyer and financial adviser; Beau also became a lawyer and served as Delaware’s attorney general; and Ashley became a social worker and activist. Beau Biden served as a major in the Delaware Army National Guard and was the inspiration for Jill Biden’s book, God Bless Our Troops. He died in 2015 after suffering from brain cancer. In 2017, Joe and Jill Biden founded the Biden Cancer Initiative, which operated until 2019.

Jill Biden is a grandmother to several grandchildren, including Naomi, Finnegan, Maisy, Natalie, and Hunter. She is an avid runner and has competed in a number of competitive races, including several 5Ks, 10Ks, and half-marathons. As Second Lady, Biden served as an honorary co-chairperson for the Susan G. Komen Global Race for the Cure, a series of running and walking events to raise money to combat breast cancer.

Bibliography

Bennett, Kate. “Jill Biden’s Trip to Romania and Slovakia Includes Spending Mother’s Day with Ukrainian Refugees.” CNN, 5 May 2022, www.cnn.com/2022/05/05/politics/jill-biden-romania-slovakia-ukraine/index.html. Accessed 19 Sept. 2022.

Biden, Jill. Where the Light Enters: Building a Family, Discovering Myself. Flatiron Books, 2019.

Choi, Matthew. “Jill Biden Opens Up About Family in Candid DNC Appearance.” Politico, 19 Aug. 2020, www.politico.com/news/2020/08/19/jill-biden-dnc-speech-398335. Accessed 29 Oct. 2020.

“Dr. Jill Biden.” The Obama White House, obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/administration/jill-biden. Accessed 1 Oct. 2020.

“Dr. Jill Biden: First Lady.” White House, 2021, www.whitehouse.gov/administration/dr-jill-biden. Accessed 21 Jan. 2021.

Jean-Philippe, McKenzie. “Jill Biden Still Plans to Teach If She Becomes First Lady.” Oprah Magazine, 19 Aug. 2020, www.oprahmag.com/entertainment/a26883119/joe-biden-wife-jill/. Accessed 29 Oct. 2020.

Maloney, Maggie. “Why Jill Biden Might Just Be Joe Biden’s Greatest Political Asset.” Town & Country, 19 Aug. 2020, www.townandcountrymag.com/society/politics/a26944878/jill-biden-joe-biden-wife-facts/. Accessed 29 Oct. 2020.

Menas, Amanda. “Who Is Dr. Jill Biden? 7 Things You Need to Know.” National Education Association, 23 Apr. 2020, educationvotes.nea.org/2020/04/23/who-is-dr-jill-biden-7-things-you-need-to-know/. Accessed 29 Oct. 2020.

Rogers, Katie. “A First for a First Lady: Jill Biden Will Balance Her Career and East Wing Duties.” The New York Times, 20 Jan. 2021, www.nytimes.com/2021/01/20/us/politics/jill-biden-first-lady.html. Accessed 19 Sept. 2022.

Stockler, Asher. “10 Things to Know About Joe Biden’s Wife, Dr. Jill Biden.” Newsweek, 15 Mar. 2020, www.newsweek.com/10-things-know-about-joe-bidens-wife-dr-jill-biden-1492404. Accessed 29 Oct. 2020.