Im more than willing to work with him. A senator, a Vice President , and finally President Elect on his third try. I pledge to be a president who seeks not to divide but unify. Tonight, do you see yourself as the Polar Opposite of donald trump . I hope so. A cnn special report. Fight for the white house joe bidens long journey. Its a good night its a good night and it seems to be getting even better. More than 30 years after his first run for the presidency joe biden with a lead tonight and a lead overall in the del inaugurate race. On his third try for the white house. We are very much alive it was the Sweet Super Tuesday that joe biden had always dreamed of, setting a clear path to the nomination finally at age 77. It was like, okay, lets buckle up. Were going to go. It was a really good feeling. It was glorious. Glorious and unusual to say the least. Fact no one has ever come in fourth in iowa and fifth in New Hampshire and gone on to become the democratic president ial nominee. To do as poorly as he did in the first two contests where i come from that the opening bell. To have the day he had on super tuesday was highly, highly unusual, defied the laws of politics. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Its a day joseph rob net biden jr. Has been waiting for for decades. How long has joe biden wanted to be president of the United States . I first met him in 1972 and clearly he was not ruling out the possibility. He was 29 years old. Theres a story of the non nun holding up a paper that little joey wrote when he was 12 years old saying he wanted to be president. If a nun said it it has to be true. And still is. But the brass ring has some big strings attached. A country facing the Worsten Feshs disease crisis we have seen since 1919. The worst economic crisis we have seen since the great depression. The worst Racism Crisis we have seen since 1968. Revolution its a Triple Threat of crises. All at once all combined. Biden has described himself as a transitional candidate but a Triple Threat could require drastic, urgent action. The economy cannot survive if we dont get control of covid. Thats going to be the thing thats going to affect every single thing that gets done. From the beginning, when he was just joey from scranton,p. A. Biden wanted to be the one to get things done. Joe biden was always the lead dog. He had to be number one, he was in the number one position. A natural leader his friends say. He always followed joe. And a natural talker. An old joke about joe that if joe biden were standing knicks to an Electric Light Pole hed strike up a conversation. Big, boisterous family. Constantly playing pranks on each other. With at least nine of them in this modest home. Joey was the eldest of four then came valerie, jimmy and frankie. The childrens maternal grandparents lived there, too along with an aunt, sometimes an uncle and their parents. Joseph r. Biden sr. And Katherine Finnegan biden. My mom was fierce in her commitment to family. She told us growing up that theres family and theres family and theres family. I remember going to my mother once, i guess i was in fifth grade saying, mom, i love you more than anything. She said, joey, i know how much you love me but youre closer to your brother and sister than you are to me. I said how . She said, you are the same blood. You are closer to them. Theyre with you all the time. Never forget that. Mom said that we were a gift to one another and we believed her. Let me ask you about your sister whos been incredibly supportive to you. What role has val played in your life . Shes been my best friend my whole life. Shes been on the handlebars of my bicycle i guess since excuse me. Since she was 3 years old. I never went a place i didnt take her. Taught her how to play ball. To this day . To this day. All the way through. Theres sayings. Dad said to us its not how many times you get knocked down. Its how quickly you get up and dad was all about resilience. Especially after losing his job when biden was young. They were forced to move away from that you are childhood home to find opportunity in wilmington. They had to reinvent themselves there. I made him very close to his family as families often become much closer during adversity. Faith helped, too. Family and faith were the bookends and we were an Irish Catholic middle class household. Our Family Values taking care of one another, treating people with respect, being resilient, those values coincided with the catholic social doctrine we learned every single dayality school. There but by The Grace Of God go i. You are your brothers keeper. It was a seamless way of life. A seamless way of life for a determined Young Joe Biden. Richard ben cramer writes about your brother as a child and said joey was always quick with a grace born of cocky self possession. He didnt like some kids his age double think himself. Once joey set his mind it wasnt like he thought at all. He just did. The more serious he set his mind to do is he stuttered terribly and he really couldnt string more than three or four words together at a time and he determined that he was not going to be defined by stutter. Teenage boys can be pretty harsh, even cruel, and he used to get teased a lot. They called him stutterhead. For short they called him substitute. So the summer before joe bidens junior year poetry helped him lose his stutter. I would do poetry to try to say meek young man grow up in libraries. Thats emerson. Yes. And the reason i did it was to try to get a cadence to how you speak. When youre able to change the cadence of what you do and say it seems you can overcome it somehow. I think all of us were surprised in late august and september when we went back to school that he wasnt stuttering anymore. The high school was an academy, an elite Catholic School he worked hard to attend because he viewed it as a gateway to success. He was on the football team. He was a half back. He made some key plays in some of those games. Off the field friends remember a time he stood up for a buddy. It happened when he went to a diner with some classmates including the only black kid in the class. The restaurants policy that we dont serve, they didnt use word at the time. He must have said negros. Frank said, i leave. Joe said, sit down. This is 1961. This is before the civil rights act. And before the Voting Rights act. And before there was much sensitivity i would say at least for teenage boys, white boys, about civil rights issues. Biden says he learned about the reality of Race Relations here while lifeguarding in a black neighborhood in the early 1960s when delaware was very divided, racially and culturally. The polish neighborhood, irish neighborhood, the black neighborhood. He stood out but worked hard to fit in. Once you come in the neighborhood and somebody like you, you become like brothers. You become the friends. Thats how joe and i came. I was about probably 9 when i first met him. I was one of the onry kids in the pool. He would be dennis the mayor of wilmington. Joe saw an opportunity, the door was open and he was going to get in. Hes going to make friends and he was going to talk to people and he was going to know this community and have the Community Trust him because i know joe had aspirations of going places. He was already politicking and planning his surprising next moves. Up next, success. I will never, ever think anything is impossible again in my entire life. Followed by tragedy. I remember looking up and saying, god. I was so angry. So angry. You know you can shorten your cold with coldeeze® lozenges. Coldeeze® can shorten your cold by 42 . It releases zinc ions that some scientists believe inhibit cold viruses from replicating. 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By early 1964 joe biden was a student at the university of delaware. Still full of confidence but low on cash. When he and two buddies decided to head to ft. Lauderdale for spring break. The first day we went on the beach, it was like 10,000 guys and 20 girls. The odds just did not look good for us. Lo and behold a plane goes by with a sign saying round trips to nassau 28. Joe, what do you think . Got to go. Lets go. They arrive to discover the College Women on private hotel beaches, which they couldnt afford. We found some of the hotel towels on the fence. We grabbed them and put them around our shoulders and waist and walked in like we stayed there all along. They were there just a few minutes when they spotted a young woman they all wanted to meet. Melia hunter. A 21yearold senior at syracuse university. Im saying lets flip a coin or one potato, two potato. And while im trying to figure it out, im looking at my hands, he takes off. Hes got a 50yard dash on both of us and by the time we get over there, hes sitting there chatting her up. When i met nelia, gods truth, i knew i was going to marry her. I really did. Second night as i left i said i think ill marry you. She said, i think so. He said frank, im in love and going to Syracuse Law School. Just as planned biden made it to Syracuse Law School and married Neilia Hunter a year later in the summer of 1966. After graduation he returned home with his wife to work at a law firm. National guardsmen were still patrolling the streets of wilmington in the wake of rioting that followed Martin Luther kings murder. Wasnt good at all. We looked like a City Under Siege by the military. He saw a country torn apart by race. A city that was wlit rally on fire. The National Guard occupied wilmington, delaware, longer than any city in america after the riots following kings assassination. And in that moment a Young Joe Biden said i can help. Biden was a believer in his own ability to convince anyone of anything but no amount of selfconfidence or ambition was big enough to deliver a senate seat at age 27. So, he ran for the county council. As usual, he enlisted his sister. So how did you get involved in the politics of it . He always picked me first. It was just a natural thing to do. He was going to go in the politics. I was going with him. He ask everybody we knew to help us and we asked them to ask ten people to help us. This is where we delivered. We knocked on every door. He won and a year later, biden found his real opening while attending a Political Convention in delaware. I went back to the motel to shave for the evening and i got a knock in my door and in walks four people. They said we got to talk to you, joe. I had a towel around me, just shaven. They said we think you should run for the senate. I said, whoa, im not old enough. A judge in the group set him straight. Said joe, you obviously didnt do very well on constitutional law. It says you have to be 30 to be sworn in, not 30 to be elected. It was awe delicious if not arrogant for biden to run as a 29yearold underdog candidate of change against a wellliked republican senator named kale boggs. What is your last name . Miller. I know the miller family. He had been governor and member of congress for two terms and running for a third term in the United States senate. Kale boggs was loved. I mean, he was loved. Once again, biden asked valerie to run the show. I remember saying to him, joey, i cant run a statewide campaign. I dont know how to do that. Remember, hes 28, 27, im 25, 26. He said dont worry about it, valerie, well figure it out. She reached out to a local Democratic Party activist, ted kaufman. Youre running On Civil Rights and environment. Youre running on tax reform. And those are really good issues. Silence. I said, but i dont think you have a chance at winning. You said what . I dont think you have a chance of winning. You dont have a chance. Kale boggs is incredible. Youve been in this for two years. You look like youre 25 years old. This is a race to run in order to make these issues you care about, i say you can do that but there is no chance you can win. And his reaction to that was . Well, just come and help me. Just come and help me. Well see. Well see. Biden was confident he could talk his way into voters hearts but what kaufman saw was bleak. On labor day, we did a big time polling. You know what the number was . 47 for boggs, 19 for biden. But it was also the first year 18yearolds could vote and young voters saw a candidate who was promising that he understands whats happening today. 50 years later, this time as a political elder trying to connect with young voters, its still his mantra. They have a funny feeling that kale boggs just his heart wasnt in it. Hed been talked into running One More Time by richard nixon. Joe wants to talk to you for a few minutes and vote that democratic ticket november. And then. We snuck up on him. Boggs, this is a nixon landslide year. Nobody expected a democrat to win and that was the truth. We won by 3,100 votes. On election night, i remember as if it was yesterday. I said, i will never, ever think anything is impossible again in my entire life. Happy birthday he turned 30, the eligible age to serve three weeks later. He and neilia already had a picture perfect young family. A baby named naomi and two joseph biden iii or beau and hunter. The young family was moving to the nations capitol. For six weeks we were on top of the world. I mean, he was the dragon slayer. We were the bright young hope of the Democratic Party and it was completely joyful. On december 18th, neilia was supposed to go with her husband to washington but decided to stay behind to buy a tree and christmas gifts. I went with joe to washington to interview staff. Senator bird offered joe to use his office, which we did. And then came the phone call. It was jimmy biden and i picked up the phone and jimmy biden said, come home now. Theres a terrible accident. With neilia and the boys and the baby, all three. You flew back . We didnt say a word. We just it was a bumpy ride. I remember that. It was a tiny plane. I remember he was on my right and i just had my hand on his leg, and we just i mean, we you know, you know. Smooth driving pays off with allstate, the safer you drive the more you save you never been in better hands allstate click or call for a quote today now, braava jet mops right where you need it with an adjustable Precision Jet spray and an advanced pad system. And offers personalized Cleaning Suggestions unique to your home. Braava jet m6 and the irobot home app. Only from irobot. Inflammation in your eye might be to blame. Ck, Braava Jet M6 and the irobot home app. Looks like a great day for achy, burning eyes overthecounter eye drops typically work by lubricating your eyes and may provide temporary relief. Ha these drops probably wont touch me. Xiidra works differently, targeting inflammation that can cause dry eye disease. What is that . Xiidra, noooo it can provide lasting relief. Xiidra is the only fda approved treatment specifically for the signs and symptoms of dry eye disease. One drop in each eye, twice a day. Dont use if youre allergic to xiidra. Common side effects include eye irritation, discomfort or blurred vision when applied to the eye, and unusual taste sensation. Dont touch container tip to your eye or any surface. After using xiidra, wait 15 minutes before reinserting contacts. Got any room in your eye . Talk to an eye doctor about twicedaily xiidra. I prefer you didnt xiidra. Not today, dry eye. One week before christmas 1972, joe biden and his sister traveled to d. C. To hire staff. His wife neilia stayed in delaware with their three children to buy a tree. The memory that i have thats most vivid is walking in the russell building with the echo of just our shoes. I remember looking up in the rotunda saying, god. I was so angry. I got a call from a first responder, and i said, what happened . He said, well, there was a Tractor Trailer and your wife and daughter are dead. Neilia and the bidens baby naomi were killed when a truck hit their station wagon. The boys were very badly injured. They were hospitalized. Hunter with a fractured skull and beau was in a body cast with both arms, both legs, you had to pick him up and carry him this way. Biden thought their bedside, not the senate, was where he ought to be. Your brother is clearly considering not being sworn in. He doesnt want to be senator. He spoke to the governor to replace him. But the Senate Majority leader Mike Mansfield changed bidens mind. He said, your wife worked really hard for you to get elected, cared a great deal about it. Get sworn in and just stay six months. If in six months or so there is a conflict between my being a good father and being a good senator, i promise you that i will contact the governorelect as i had earl