There Are So Many Weird Things About Jill And Joe Biden's Marriage

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Joe Biden and Jill Biden have been together for half a century, proving their love is strong enough to withstand the turbulences of a lifetime in the political spotlight. And they've arguably endured more than most. Former president Biden has experienced a series of tragic events, from the loss of his first wife and baby daughter to the death of his son, Beau Biden, from brain cancer and Hunter Biden's legal troubles. Through it all, Jill was right by her husband's side. That's not to say their marriage is perfect.

In fact, their relationship has displayed a flair for the strange since the beginning. For starters, Jill initially had reservations about Joe and their age gap. Even after she got over that hurdle, Joe had to propose many times before she said yes. And he had to give her an ultimatum. Part of her reluctance stemmed from her divorce — and with good reason. Jill's ex-husband came back to haunt her after she rose to prominence, claiming she had been lying for years about how she met Joe.

But none of it has gotten in the way of the Bidens' chemistry in bed, something Joe is eager to tell whoever is around to listen. Jill and Joe clearly get along great, but they also occasionally fight. However, they prefer to do it over text to prevent others from overhearing their arguments. Jill and Joe's marriage has stood the test of time, but it also has a slew of weird aspects to it.

Jill Biden was hesitant to become Joe Biden's wife — really hesitant. He had to ask her a whopping five times before she agreed to become Mrs. Joe Biden. And he had to give her an ultimatum, too. "'Look, this is the last time I'm asking you. I don't care when we get married. But I want a commitment.'" he recalled telling her in a 2016 joint interview with Vogue. "And she said okay. But it took that!" However, Jill had her reasons to question whether a life next to Joe was right for her.

Jill knew she would have to give up the life she knew to take on a supporting role in someone else's. "Being Joe's wife would mean a life in the spotlight that I had never wanted," she penned her 2019 book, "Where the Light Enters: Building a Family, Discovering Myself" (via Time). "I was a college student when we'd first met, and I liked living under the radar. Joe lived with constant public visibility." Then, there was her previous marriage.

The acrimonious divorce between Jill and her ex-husband, Bill Stevenson, left her doubtful marriage was for her. "I never wanted to feel so out of control of my heart again," she explained. It took her time, but she got there. "I was slowly learning to trust again, because Joe and the boys made me feel secure in their love," she wrote. Jill finally said yes in the spring of 1977.

When Joe Biden met Jill Biden in 1975, he was 32 and she was 23. Their age difference didn't go unnoticed by the then-college student when she opened the door to the man she had agreed to go on a blind date with. "I was a senior, and I had been dating guys in jeans and clogs and T-shirts, he came to the door and he had a sport coat and loafers, and I thought, 'God, this is never going to work, not in a million years.' He was nine years older than I am!" she said in the Vogue interview.

Jill's doubts were all but gone after they returned from watching "A Man and a Woman" in Philadelphia. Joe was in fact like no one she had ever dated, but in the best way. "I went upstairs and called my mother at 1:00 a.m. and said, 'Mom, I finally met a gentleman,'" she recalled. While the Bidens' age gap might be bigger than many might have known, it isn't as big as some have claimed.

In 2022, Joe went viral when internet users distorted what he said in a speech to make it sound like he had met Jill when she was a child and he was an adult. "She was 12; I was 30. But anyway, this woman helped me get an awful lot done," Joe said, but he was referring to someone in the crowd, USA Today reported. 

Joe and Jill Biden were introduced by the former president's brother, Frank Biden, who arranged their first date. Joe had become interested in Jill after seeing her photo in an advertisement. Frank was studying at the University of Delaware at the same time as Jill and got her number on his brother's behalf. Not everyone agrees with that version of events, though. Jill Biden's ex-husband has claimed she and Joe had an affair when she was still married to him.

Bill Stevenson, then a local business owner in Delaware, contended he and Jill met Joe and his late wife Neilia Biden after they donated $10,900 to Joe's first campaign. "Jill and I sat in the Bidens' kitchen," he told the Daily Mail in 2020. "We worked on his campaign." Following Joe's first wife's tragic death in December 1972, he became close with Jill, Stevenson claimed. By August 1974, he had become suspicious there was more going on between the two than a friendship.

According to Stevenson, he got confirmation when someone came looking for money relating to a fender bender involving his car. When Stevenson pressed for details, the man claimed Joe, then a senator, had been driving the car with Jill in the passenger's seat. "I asked Jill to leave the house, which she did," he said. Jill denied her ex-husband's version of the facts. "These claims are fictitious, seemingly to sell and promote a book," her spokesperson told Inside Edition. 

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Many consider a couple's intimate life to have no space in work conversations, but Joe Biden is reportedly not among them. Before Joe launched his successful 2020 presidential run, he suffered two failed campaigns and contemplated running a few other times before backing out. When he decided against running in 2004, he told a group of supporters he had a better way of spending his time. "I'd rather be at home making love to my wife while my children are asleep," he said, according to Katie Rogers' 2024 book, "American Woman" (via The Guardian).

Joe's spokesperson was unfazed, suggesting it wasn't the first time. "[He's] frankly totally in love with his wife," the rep said. Aides were no strangers to Joe's arguments that "good sex" was the key to his successful marriage. He reportedly toned down such talk considerably after winning the presidency — but not entirely. In a 2021 Vogue interview, he opened up about how life in the White House had gotten in their way. "Once a month we'd just go up to a local bed-and-breakfast by ourselves, to make sure we had a romantic time," he said.

Joe had been making sexual remarks about his spouses since he burst onto the political scene. Not even Neilia Biden's death could keep Joe from reminiscing about her beauty. "She had the best body of any woman I ever saw. She looks better than a Playboy bunny, doesn't she?" Joe told the Washingtonian in 1974. 

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Joe Biden and Jill Biden may have great chemistry in bed and not be afraid to demonstrate their affection publicly, but that doesn't mean they never have arguments. However, the public is unlikely to ever witness one. That's because the Bidens take special measures to refrain from arguing in front of others, especially Secret Service agents. Instead, they exchange their harsh words over text messages. They even have a term for it: fexting.

While they worry about making a scene in front of others, Joe and Jill seem a lot less worried about the long-term consequences of their fexts. Well, at least Jill is. "Joe said, 'You realize that's going to go down in history. There will be a record of that.' I won't tell you what I called him that time," she told Harper's Bazaar in 2022 of her husband's reminder that all presidential communications are kept as part of the historical record.

That wasn't the first time Jill had resorted to written words to speak her mind. When Democratic leaders kept trying to convince her husband to enter the presidential race in 2004, she used an unusual tactic to make her opinion known. "I drew NO on my stomach in big letters, and marched through the room in my bikini. Needless to say, they got the message," she wrote in her memoir (via The Hill). Perhaps that's what inspired Joe to tell supporters he'd rather have sex than run ...