I’ve seen the best of Joe Biden up close
Just days after I began my internship for Vice President Joe Biden in 2015, his son Beau passed away from an aggressive form of brain cancer at 46 years old. Biden has often said that Beau, an attorney and attorney general of Delaware, had “all the best of me but with the bugs and flaws engineered out.”
Well, I’ve seen the best of Joe Biden up close: his leadership, integrity and commitment to making life better for ordinary people.
Those were the traits that led Beau to encourage his father to run for president in 2016, but Biden decided against it. Instead, he devoted his energies to the Cancer Moonshot; an unprecedented national effort to accelerate cancer research and improve prevention, detection and care.
He knew that his family’s cancer story wasn’t unique and he wanted to do everything in his power as vice president to ensure that other families would be spared the suffering and loss that his endured.
Biden often says, “There is nothing we can’t accomplish if we come together as Americans.” So Biden assembled the best experts America has to offer — in cancer research and treatment, patient advocacy, and business and technology — to move the ball further and faster than ever before.
The goal was to achieve a decade of progress in only five years — an ambitious objective, but one Biden knew we had the capacity to achieve.
After he left the White House, he formed the Biden Cancer Initiative, a nonprofit organization, to continue this vital work. Even then, when he no longer had the power of federal office, he demonstrated strong leadership. He convened the country’s foremost cancer experts to carry on the mission they started at the White House.
As a staff assistant with the Initiative, I observed Biden study 100-page binders, ask experts probing questions, emphasize the human stakes and
demand swifter action. He was singularly focused on improving health care for all of us.
I also saw the former vice president write personal notes of encouragement to cancer patients — and too often notes of condolence to their loved ones. We have all heard about Joe Biden’s empathy (and that is real) but what I appreciated most was his hopefulness.
In those letters and in daily conversation, he always gave the suffering and the grief-stricken a reason to believe that things would get better. And he did his level best to make sure that things would get better.
That is the Joe Biden I know. He is a true team player who does his homework and listens to the experts. As the former vice president, he is ready to lead on Day One. He has a robust plan to combat COVID-19, expand access to health care, protect people with preexisting conditions, and build our economy back better for everyone.
He will let Dr. Anthony Fauci do his job as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and ensure that front-line workers get paid fairly for doing theirs. And he will eliminate out-of-pocket costs for anyone seeking COVID-19 testing, treatment or
preventive services, including a vaccine.
But more than that, Joe Biden will restore decency to the White House. He knows we need to bring people together. He knows that while we may not always agree, we all love this country.
And he knows the presidency isn’t about him — it is about us. It is about a worker being able to get a good-paying, full-time job — and the dignity that comes with a paycheck. It is about a parent being able to promise their child everything will be OK— and mean it.
And it is about the president being able to tell the American people we will beat the virus and rebuild our country — and actually get the job done. In a Biden administration, the focus would be on us, where it belongs.
Joe Biden believes America’s best days are ahead because he knows our potential is limited only by our willingness to work together to solve hard problems. That is why he will be a great president for all Americans.
I know he will make Pennsylvania proud.