Neilia Hunter Biden: How the deaths of Joe Biden’s first wife and daughter changed his politics

Joe Biden’s ongoing recovery from the trauma of the deaths of his first wife and youngest child has dramatically shaped his career, from the ways in which he speaks to crowds about grief and mourning to his views on healthcare.

Though not unique to his brand of politicking, the president has famously framed his current ideas through the lens of his past.

While out shopping just days before Christmas in 1972, his 30-year-old wife Neilia and 13-month-old daughter Naomi were killed in a car accident after a tractor-trailer carrying corn broadsided the family’s Chevrolet station wagon.

Campaign literature featuring the young senator-elect from Delaware littered the streets.

Their two sons, Joseph “Beau” Biden III and Robert Hunter Biden, survived. More than 40 years later, Beau died following a brain cancer diagnosis.

The daughter of successful diner operators in New York state, Neilia Hunter was born on 28 July 1942 in the affluent town of Skaneateles. She graduated from Penn Hall Preparatory School in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, in 1960.

She participated in French club, hockey, swimming, student council, was the photography editor of the Penntonian, vice president and then president of the International Relations Club – according to her school’s yearbook.

In 1963, Neilia, then a college sophomore at Syracuse University, met Mr Biden, then a junior at the University of Delaware, on the beach in Nassau during spring break.

Asked about his career goals, Mr Biden told his future wife’s mother: “President.” After he earned his bachelor’s degree in Delaware, Mr Biden moved to Syracuse for law school. There, Neilia earned her master’s degree in English and taught special needs students.

They married on 27 August 1966 while he was still enrolled in law school. He has called his time there “a dangerous combination of arrogant and sloppy” and ultimately graduated 76th in a class of 85.

Following his graduation, the couple moved to the suburb of Wilmington, where he practised law and joined the New Castle County Council.

Though Neilia Hunter was a Republican, Neilia Biden registered as a Democrat, according to The News Journal.

The couple’s first and only daughter Naomi was born 8 November 1971, the youngest of three children, with two older brothers Beau and Hunter. She had the nickname “Amy”.

One year later, Mr Biden challenged Republican incumbent J Caleb Boggs for a Delaware seat in the US Senate seat.

Neilia became his closest adviser and the “brains” behind his campaign, The News Journal reported.

The family campaigned across the state, mounting a lucrative grassroots campaign attacking his Republican incumbent as old and out of touch, a shock to the status quo highlighting the generational divide between the elder conservative statesman’s base and a much younger electorate following the Vietnam War and civil rights movement. It also was the first year 18 year olds were eligible to vote.

The 30-year-old underdog won the race in November 1972.

The following month, Neilia asked her husband, “What’s going to happen, Joey? Things are too good,” The News Journal reported.

One week before Christmas, the senator-elect was in Washington DC interviewing staff members for his new office when he received the news about the deaths of his wife and daughter.

Xural.com