Imagine believing in your husband so much that you not only encourage him to run for president, but spend every weekend — after a full work-week — flying to Iowa to campaign on his behalf. Welcome to the life of Dr. Jill Biden.

“It’s a little challenging in that I’m always changing hats,” she said. “I’m grading papers in the car between campaign stops… It’s a little hard to transition some of the time, but life is never dull.”

Jill, spouse of Delaware Sen. Joe Biden, has been an educator for 27 years. She has taught as a reading specialist, as a high school English teacher, in a mental health institution and, for the past 15 years, at a community college. Even now, in the thick of a presidential campaign, she continues to spend five days a week in the classroom before traveling to Iowa on weekends. She also proudly admits that she brought all of this on herself.

“Actually, this time, we went to Joe and asked him to run,” she said. “After Bush won again I was flabbergasted. I mean, I didn’t know anybody at all who voted for Bush. I just didn’t think he could win again. I was so disappointed in the fact that John Kerry didn’t win and that Bush’s policies were going to continue.

“We talked as a family before Joe even knew about it and we went to Joe two years ago and said, ‘We think you are the only one that can pull together the red states and the blue states and build consensus on issues that are important. We think you should run.’ And, he did.”

Although Jill and the rest of the Biden clan gladly accept responsibility for pushing the Delaware senator into becoming a candidate for president, the couple owes credit to Joe’s brother for their introduction.

“I was at the University of Delaware and I knew Joe’s brother,” she said. “Joe’s brother suggested to him that he ask me out. I had met Joe… you know how you go to fund raisers and shake hands? That really was the extent of it. When he called me so out of the blue my first thought was ‘How did he get my number?’”

Joe phone Jill on a Saturday afternoon… and she already had a date.

“He asked if I couldn’t cancel the other date because he was only in town for one night,” she said. “So, I did. I canceled the other date, because I thought it might be interesting to go out and see what he was like. We went out and, two years later, we were married.”

When Jill met Joe, he had two sons, Beau and Hunter. His previous wife and young daughter had been killed in an automobile accident.

“We dated together,” she said. “Most dates we all dated together. We got married as a family. We were all there and the boys were on the alter when we got married.”

Five years later, the couple had a daughter, Ashley. All of the children are now grown and five grandchildren have been added to the family. Since Joe previously launched a bid for the White House in the late 1980s, the family members are no strangers to national politics or Iowa.

“I spent the summer of 1987 out here in Iowa because [Joe] in Washington fighting the nomination of Robert Bork to the United States Supreme Court,” she said. “Wherever I go I run into a lot of people that supported Joe — a lot of teachers for Biden with our little apple pins on. I see a lot of the old friends who are signing up again and coming back. It’s great. I mean, I feel very comfortable. I feel very at home here in Iowa. It’s very much like Delaware in that Delaware is agricultural and the people are friendly. This is where I come. When they send people out to other states, they always send me to Iowa because this is where I like coming the best.”

Despite urging her husband to run for the nation’s highest office and working on the stump each weekend for the campaign, Jill says she probably wouldn’t be politically active if she wasn’t married to Joe.

“I would not say that I’m a political activist,” she said. “I think we care about a lot of the same things. I think we have the same morals and values. I think those are the things that tie us together. Of course, we care about a lot of the same things, but we don’t always have the same position on issues or I may care about something more than he does. I like to say that we compliment one another. I don’t think I’d be involved [in politics] otherwise. I don’t know.

“I think I am like the average American. I’m in a community college classroom. I have students who are working and going to school and have children. I think I’m dealing with real life every single day. I take that home to Joe and say, ‘Look. These students can’t afford college. They are having these problems. We have to change this. We have to change that.’ I think what I do in my life experiences has a positive impact on Joe and, hopefully, it expands to have a positive influence on other people.”

Jill’s life passions are currently split between the Biden Breast Health Initiative and education.

“In 1993, I had three close friends who had breast cancer and, actually, one of those friends died,” she said. “As an educator, my first thought was to what I could do. I mean, I’m not a medical person, but what could I do as an educator. So, I developed the Biden Breast Health Initiative. We go into the high schools and teach the young girls about breast self-exam, the importance of early detection, good breast health and health practices. Hopefully they go home and they talk to their moms and grandmoms or sisters and they practice [breast self-exam]. Early detection is the key.”

She said that, as First Lady, her primary focus would be education, but more in the realm of life-long learners.

“[My focus] would include not just the issues in the schools, but the health care issues,” she said. “I do think that we should educate young women about breast health and breast self-exam. And I also think we have to educate about childhood obesity, smoking and so many things. So it would definitely be education in the broader sense.”

She also looks at other issues, like national security, with a wide lens.

“I want to return to a time when Americans feel safe again,” she said. “That doesn’t mean just with the issue of terrorism. I want them to feel safe in all aspects of their life whether it is with their health care, sending their kids to school or crime on the streets. I think Joe can address all those issues. Of course, he is a leader in foreign policy and I think that’s what makes the difference for Joe Biden as a president versus the other candidates. I think he is the only who can really reach across the aisle, unite the red states and the blue states, work with Republicans as well as Democrats and that’s why he is successful.”

Joe’s youngest sister, Valerie, helped run his 1972 campaign bid against a popular Republican incumbent, Sen. J. Caleb Boggs, whom Biden defeated at age 29, becoming the fifth-youngest senator in U.S. history. Valerie Biden-Owens has run every campaign for her brother Joe during his 37-year political career, so it’s not surprising that she’s serving as Joe’s national chairwoman in his current presidential bid. While the rest of Biden’s family members commute back and forth to Iowa to campaign, Valerie has set up shop in Iowa, where she intends to help ramp up the campaign’s efforts.

Meanwhile, Joe’s wife, Jill, and his two sons, Beau and Hunter, have been crisscrossing the state, where they’ve been retail politicking on behalf of Joe. The Bidens have popped up at meet-and-greets, Democratic fund-raisers, rallies and other campaign events, including the Johnson County Democrats’ Barbeque in Iowa City (see picture below).

To read the interview and view the video with the Bidens at the barbeque fund-raiser on Oct. 6, read below the fold.Iowa Independent: The Bidens have shifted gears and are putting more focus on campaigning in Iowa. Why the shift and what have been some of your experiences while campaigning in Iowa?

Beau: This is the way we’ve done it for 34 years. Iowa reminds us of home. Even though it’s a much bigger state than ours, you have to remember that there’s only about 125,000 caucus-goers and 99 counties, so you can actually get around and actually meet a lot of these people.
We’re used to going around and knocking on doors, spending time at peoples’ kitchen tables, and we think this works to my father’s advantage. Once you get to know my father, you get to like, if not love him. On top of that, he’s the most qualified person in the race to be president. We see Iowa as a strategic advantage for us, starting with the great people here in Iowa.

Iowa Independent: Regarding the poll numbers, do you think Senator Biden is going to get some more traction or a bump now that you’ve shifted your strategy to focus more on Iowa?

Hunter: (Watch Adam Burke’s video below)

Jill: Joe is the only one who can bring together the red states and the blue states. He’s known for bringing the Democrats and Republicans together.

Iowa Independent: What role did you play in Senator Biden’s decision to make another run for president?

Jill: Actually, we got together and we went to Joe and we said we think you are the only one who can win the presidency. We want you to run and win.

Beau: The bottom line is that our dad and mom have been great parents to us. I only hope that, as a father, I can be half as good at raising my children.

The reality is that I would rather have my dad down the street from me, where he could give me advice on how to put my 18-month-old to bed, than out on the campaign trail. There’s something just as important here, and that’s the future of our country and our world.

Hunter: There’s another reason I’m here, and when I say this, I want you to know that I’m not pandering. You know what made the decision easier? It’s Iowa. We were here in 1987 and that was not an easy time for us. What made it much easier for us deciding to run again is the loyalty and the love of people here in Iowa. We’ve kept in touch with these same folks for 20 years. They have stood behind my dad, and more importantly, they stood behind us, and that means a lot to me and my family

Hunter and Jill Biden Campaigning in Iowa (Johnson County Democrats’ BBQ)

Earlier in the evening the family took the stage on behalf of Joe, with Beau speaking on behalf of his father, who was in New Hampshire delivering the keynote address at the Coos County Democrats Harry S. Truman Dinner. This is not the first time Beau, the attorney general of Delaware, has stumped for his father in Iowa.

Donning his military hat, figuratively speaking of course, Beau stumped at the Iowa Democratic Party Veterans’ Caucus Presidential Extravaganza in Des Moines in June. Beau is a captain in the Delaware National Guard, which is scheduled to deploy to Iraq early next year. Speaking as a military member, Beau made the case why his father would be the most qualified to be president in 2009, touting the candidate’s foreign policy experience and why Democrats can ill-afford to nominate a candidate who cannot pass the “national security test.” (see video below).

Drawing on these same themes, Beau added a familial dimension to his stump speech in Johnson County as he went to bat for his father. “Let me tell you about him, because I know Iowans want to meet the candidates once, twice, and kick the tires to what mettle and grit you have,” Beau told the audience, which was packed in the swine barn on the Johnson County fairgrounds. “Let me tell you about what grit and mettle my father has. In 1972, my father was elected to the United States Senate, becoming the first Senator he had ever met. He ran to end the war in Vietnam and continue the Civil Rights movement. But like a lot of us who has experienced great triumph comes great tragedy sometimes.”

At this point, Beau’s speech replayed the events surrounding the tragic accident in 1972, which took the life of Beau’s 14-month old sister and his mother, Neilia, when the car they were riding in was struck by a tractor-trailer truck. Beau and Hunter were also in the car and Beau was hospitalized after the accident. On Dec. 18 of that year, just as the newly elected Sen. Joe Biden was about to take office for the first time, he got a phone call from home about the accident back home. “My dad left Washington that day thinking he would never return, telling the Sen. Majority leader Mike Mansfield that Delaware can get another senator, but my boys can’t get another dad.”

“He came back to Wilmington and stayed at my bedside until January 3rd the following year, when he was to be sworn in in Washington. He refused to go to Washington,” Beau continued. “Men like Hubert Humphrey and Ted Kennedy, me who had been tested in their own right, convinced him to give a shot for sixth months. The next day they sent the secretary of the senate and my dad was sworn in at my bedside.”

“My dad has been at my side and my brother’s side for 34 years since then. We met my mom and we got remarried and my mom and dad rebuilt our family. I believe, ladies and gentlemen, this is what he can do for our country. Provide hope when there sometimes isn’t and provide comfort and leadership when there isn’t any,” Beau said. “I don’t tell you this story to gain sympathy, for I know everyone in this room has a similar experience. I tell you that because it’s those personal tests that Iowans want to know about, because they serve as indicators as to how you will perform as president.”

Beau Biden: Who passes the Commander-in-Chief test? (video shot by Adam Burke at Johnson County Democrats’ Barbeque)