Biden is awarded Medal of Freedom Gregory Korte @gregorykorte
In a surprise ceremony brimming with emotion, Obama presents VP the nation’s top civilian honor
President Obama bestowed the nation’s highest civilian honor on Vice President Biden Thursday, calling his running mate and presidential understudy “the best vice president America has ever had.”
The surprise State Room ceremony was alternately humorous and poignant, with Biden turning his face from the audience to wipe away his tears.
“I had no inkling,” Biden said, saying he thought the event was supposed to be for first lady Michelle Obama. He jokingly fired his chief of staff for not telling him. “I don’t deserve this, but I know this came from the president’s heart.”
Only two others have received the honor for their service as vice president. President Ford awarded it to his vice president, Nelson Rockefeller, in 1977, and President Carter presented it to Lyndon Johnson’s vice president, Hubert Humphrey, in 1980.
But Biden’s medal also came with a rare honor: the Presidential Medal of Freedom with
Distinction. That additional designation has been bestowed to only three others: Pope John Paul II, President Reagan and former secretary of State Colin Powell.
“It is, as Joe once said, a big ... deal,” a straight-faced Obama joked, referring to Biden’s famous expletive-laden remark on the passage of the Affordable Care Act.
“He has made me a better president, and a better commander in chief,” Obama said. “When everyone else has cleared out of the room, he’s been unafraid to give it to me straight, even when we disagree. Especially when we disagreed.”
Obama recited a list of Biden’s accomplishments as vice president: leading the White House’s Middle Class Task Force, serving as the national economic stimulus “sheriff ” and manning “mission control” for the Cancer Moonshot research initiative. But he said those items do not capture the fullness of Biden’s oftenparodied persona.
“I have not mentioned Amtrak yet. Or aviators. Literally,” he said.
In his farewell address Tuesday in Chicago, Obama called Biden a “great vice president” and a “brother.” On Thursday, joking about the close friendship they’ve had, Obama said one last joint event “also gives the Internet one last chance to talk about our bromance.”
Biden accepted the award with an off-the-cuff speech in characteristic fashion, reciting Irish poems, Talmudic sayings and inside stories. He told of the time six months into his presidency when Obama told him, “You know what surprised me is how we’ve become such good friends.”
“I said, ‘Surprised you?’ ” Biden said, incredulously. “That is candid Obama.”