“It's kind of emotional for me,” Joe Biden began as he started his hometown speech in Delaware on Tuesday. Taking a moment for tears, Biden resumed “Look, you were with me my whole career, through the good times and the bad.” He spoke from the Major Joseph R. "Beau" Biden III National Guard/Reserve Center, named after his son who passed away from cancer in 2015. It was a relatively short speech, but a moving and important one for a man that has overcome great personal tragedy and shoulders some of the largest expectations for a country since President Barack Obama came into office as the first Black chief executive.
Biden’s speech was a farewell speech to Delaware as he will now take up residence as the 46th president of the United States on Wednesday. Biden spoke about meeting his wife because of Delaware, about his children and grandchildren and his son, the late Major Joseph Beau Biden. Remarking that Beau would have directed any praise coming his way to the service people of the National Guard itself, Biden said it made it “deeply personal” that his trip and subsequent inauguration would begin at the National Guard/Reserve Center.
The president-elect spoke about his first time taking the train from Delaware to the nation’s Capitol, how his driver was going to be a Black man. “And here we are today, my family and I, about to return to Washington, to meet a Black woman, of South Asian descent, to be sworn in as president and vice president of the United States.” Again, Biden remembered being on the Delaware train station platform in 2008, telling his son Beau that no one could tell him that “things can’t change. They can and they do. That’s America. ”
Biden was moved to tears again when quoting great Irish poet James Joyce, who said that when he died “Dublin will be written on my heart.” Asking the crowd to “Excuse the emotion, but when I die, Delaware will be written on my heart.”
Biden finished his speech from a powerfully emotional place, saying his only regret was that he wasn’t introducing his son Beau as the next president, to make the speech that Joe himself was now giving. “But we have great opportunities. Delaware has taught us anything is possible.”
It’s a really beautiful speech, and worth watching.