During his Senate tenure, Joe Biden was consistently ranked among the least wealthy members, which he attributed to being elected at a young age. In November 2009, Biden's net worth was only $27,012, but it had increased to $9 million by November 2020, largely due to book sales and speaking fees after his vice presidency. Political writer
Howard Fineman wrote that "Biden is not an academic, he's not a theoretical thinker, he's a great street pol. He comes from a long line of working people in Scranton—auto salesmen, car dealers, people who know how to make a sale. He has that great Irish gift." In 2021,
The Nation wrote that "Biden's attempt to identify with the working class has always been more aspiration than reality," and "he has long sought to appeal to the white working class, to position himself as part of it, even if this was as much a question of salesmanship and fantasy as anything else". Political
columnist David S. Broder wrote that Biden has grown over time, saying "he responds to real people—that's been consistent throughout." After the 2015 death of his eldest son
Beau, Biden was praised for his empathetic nature and ability to communicate about grief.
CNN wrote in 2020 that his presidential campaign aimed to make him "healer-in-chief", while the
New York Times described his extensive history of being called upon to give
eulogies. On July 2, 2010, Biden delivered a eulogy for West Virginia Senator
Robert Byrd, for which he was criticized due to Byrd's prior association with the
Ku Klux Klan. Biden has also been criticized for praising segregationist senators
John Stennis,
James Eastland, and
Strom Thurmond. A 2006 investigation by editors of the online encyclopedia
Wikipedia found that Biden staffers
had edited the site, removing and modifying descriptions of incidents of alleged plagiarism and recasting discussion of a possible
Biden 2008 presidential candidacy in a more favorable light.
Political gaffes In 2006, journalist and
TV anchor Wolf Blitzer described Biden as loquacious.
Jake Tapper said in 2007 that Biden sometimes "puts his foot in his mouth", and according to
Ben Smith, writing for
Politico in 2008, Biden often deviates from prepared remarks. In 2008,
Mark Leibovich wrote for
The New York Times that Biden's "weak filters make him capable of blurting out pretty much anything". His gaffes are commonly called "Bidenisms". Some of them have been characterized as racially insensitive. In 2006, Biden stated to an
Indian American voter that "In
Delaware, the largest growth of population is Indian Americans, moving from
India. You cannot go to a
7/11 or a
Dunkin' Donuts unless you have a slight Indian accent." In 2020, he told
Charlamagne tha God during an interview that "if you have a problem figuring out whether you're for me or
Trump, then you ain't
Black." According to
The New York Times, Biden often embellishes or exaggerates elements of his life, a trait also noted in 2014 by
The New Yorker. In October 2022, the
Washington Post wrote that Biden often
stretches the truth in order to connect with the
ethnicity or identity of his audience. Biden has claimed to have been more active in the
civil rights movement than he actually was, and has falsely recalled being an excellent student who earned three college degrees.
CBS News reported during the debate that Biden was "struggling" with a "hoarse voice."
Politico described Biden as "playing into Democrats' worst fears" and "while he wasn't speaking, he stood frozen behind his podium, mouth agape, his eyes wide and unblinking for long stretches of time." Early on the debate, Biden mistook
million for
billion and
trillionaires for
billionaires, stating, "We have a thousand trillionaires in America. I mean billionaires in America. And what’s happening? They’re in a situation where they in fact pay 8.2 percent in taxes. If they paid 24 percent, 25 percent, either one of those numbers, they’d raise $500 million—billion dollars, I should say—in a 10-year period." Later, after Biden gaffed "we finally beat
Medicare," Trump mocked Biden by responding, "Well, he’s right: He did beat Medicare. He beat it to death." When bringing up the topic of
abortion, widely considered one of the Democrat's "strongest lines of attack" against Trump, Biden attempted to remark on women being arrested for crossing state lines in search of abortion care especially in situations of
rape and
incest; however, these remarks were described in
The Atlantic as "extremely hard to follow." Biden's poor performance in the debate led directly to his
decision to withdraw from the presidential race.
In popular culture The Onion parody of Biden Between 2009 and 2019, satirical online newspaper
The Onion consistently portrayed Biden as an outrageous character who shared almost nothing in common with his namesake besides the title of vice president of the United States. The character was also known as "Diamond Joe". The publication portrayed Biden as a
blue-collar "
average Joe", an affable "goofy uncle", a
muscle car driver, an avid fan of 1980s
hair metal, a raucous party animal, a shameless
womanizer, a habitual
petty criminal, and a
drug-dealing outlaw. Biden's character became one of
The Onions most popular features during the
Obama presidency, garnering critical acclaim and a large readership. In 2019,
Joe Garden, one of the contributors to the Onion's depiction of Biden, wrote an article in
Vice Magazine expressing regret, and stating he "didn't take him seriously enough" and that
The Onion "screwed up" and "let him off easy". Despite the extreme differences between the fictional character and the real politician,
The Onion was regarded as having a significant, mostly positive influence on Biden's public image. In 2016,
Greg Kinnear portrayed then Senator Biden in the
HBO television film
Confirmation about the
controversial Clarence Thomas Supreme Court nomination hearings.
Kerry Washington portrayed
Anita Hill and
Wendell Pierce played
Clarence Thomas. Kinnear said he took the role because, "[Biden] is an interesting character, I understood his predicament, I understood the situation that he was in and I felt like that would be a great part to play." Brian Lowry of
Variety described his performance as "uncanny". Emma Brockes of
The Guardian described Kinnear as "particularly excellent". Joe McGovern of
Entertainment Weekly cited his performance as being "fantastic", adding "Kinnear nails the duality of Biden’s position, attempting on one hand to maintain comity among his colleagues in the Senate while also trying, often fecklessly, to be sensitive to Hill". ==Approval rating==