Beau Biden, the eldest son of US Vice President Joe Biden and the former attorney general of Delaware, has died of brain cancer, his family announced on Saturday. He was 46.
Beau Biden, who had served in Iraq as a lawyer with the Delaware Army National Guard, had been undergoing treatment at the Walter Reed Medical Center just outside Washington.
“He battled brain cancer with the same integrity, courage and strength he demonstrated every day of his life,” the vice president’s family said in a statement. “The entire Biden family is saddened beyond words. We know that Beau’s spirit will live on in all of us — especially through his brave wife, Hallie, and two remarkable children, Natalie and Hunter.”
Photo: AP
Beau Biden was a popular Democrat in his east coast state of Delaware and had once been expected to follow his father onto the national political stage.
He joined the US National Guard in 2003 as a judge advocate general, or military lawyer, and deployed to Iraq in 2008 as his father was campaigning for the vice presidency as US President Barack Obama’s running mate.
Beau Biden briefly considered running for the US Senate to take the seat vacated when his father became vice president after the 2008 election, but he ultimately decided to continue working as Delaware’s attorney general.
Obama paid homage late on Saturday, praising Beau Biden’s commitment to his family.
“Like his dad, Beau was a good, big-hearted, devoutly Catholic and deeply faithful man, who made a difference in the lives of all he touched — and he lives on in their hearts, but for all that Beau Biden achieved in his life, nothing made him prouder; nothing made him happier; nothing claimed a fuller focus of his love and devotion than his family. Just like his dad,” Obama said in a statement.
The death marks another devastating loss for Joe Biden, whose first wife and infant daughter were killed in a car accident as they were going Christmas shopping in 1972.
Beau Biden and his younger brother Hunter, who were also in the car, were seriously injured, but survived.
According to the New York Times, Beau Biden suffered what was described as a mild stroke in 2010. He went on to receive treatment in Texas and in 2013 had a small lesion removed from his brain.
REBUILDING: A researcher said that it might seem counterintuitive to start talking about reconstruction amid the war with Russia, but it is ‘actually an urgent priority’ Italy is hosting the fourth annual conference on rebuilding Ukraine even as Russia escalates its war, inviting political and business leaders to Rome to promote public-private partnerships on defense, mining, energy and other projects as uncertainty grows about the US’ commitment to Kyiv’s defense. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy were opening the meeting yesterday, which gets under way as Russia accelerated its aerial and ground attacks against Ukraine with another night of pounding missile and drone attacks on Kyiv. Italian organizers said that 100 official delegations were attending, as were 40 international organizations and development banks. There are
The tale of a middle-aged Chinese man, or “uncle,” who disguised himself as a woman to secretly film and share videos of his hookups with more than 1,000 men shook China’s social media, spurring fears for public health, privacy and marital fidelity. The hashtag “red uncle” was the top trending item on China’s popular microblog Sina Weibo yesterday, drawing at least 200 million views as users expressed incredulity and shock. The online posts told of how the man in the eastern city of Nanjing had lured 1,691 heterosexual men into sexual encounters at his home that he then recorded and distributed online. The
TARIFF ACTION: The US embassy said that the ‘political persecution’ against former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro disrespects the democratic traditions of the nation The US and Brazil on Wednesday escalated their row over US President Donald Trump’s support for former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro, with Washington slapping a 50 percent tariff on one of its main steel suppliers. Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva threatened to reciprocate. Trump has criticized the prosecution of Bolsonaro, who is on trial for allegedly plotting to cling on to power after losing 2022 elections to Lula. Brasilia on Wednesday summoned Washington’s top envoy to the country to explain an embassy statement describing Bolsonaro as a victim of “political persecution” — echoing Trump’s description of the treatment of Bolsonaro as
CEREMONY EXPECTED: Abdullah Ocalan said he believes in the power of politics and social peace, not weapons, and called on the group to put that into practice The jailed leader of a Kurdish militant group yesterday renewed a call for his fighters to lay down their arms, days before a symbolic disarmament ceremony is expected to take place as a first concrete step in a peace process with the Turkish state. In a seven-minute video message broadcast on pro-Kurdish Medya Haber’s YouTube channel, Abdullah Ocalan, the leader of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), said that the peace initiative had reached a stage that required practical steps. “It should be considered natural for you to publicly ensure the disarmament of the relevant groups in a way that addresses the expectations