The creators of Meet Cute NYC took a 230-mile detour down south and stopped by Washington, DC. to get the story of how the President and First Lady met for a special Valentine’s Day post. The result was a lesson in the critical role that persistence can play in bringing people together.
Meet Cute NYC documents “microportraits of modern love” and features its host, Jeremy Bernstein, asking random people the all-important question: “Excuse me, are you two a couple?”
The video opens with Mr. Biden revealing how he met Jill in 1975 after being set up by his brother. The president lost his wife, Neilia, and 1-year-old daughter, Naomi, in a car crash in 1972, leaving him the single father of 2 boys.
“He called me and said, ‘I go to school with this woman. You will love her, she is beautiful, and she doesn’t like politics,’” Mr. Biden said. The First Lady added, ”He called me on a Saturday afternoon, and he said, ‘You know this is Joe Biden, and I said, ‘How did you get my number?’ He said, ‘Would you like to go out tonight?’ I said, ‘I am sorry, I already have a date,’ and he said, ‘Well, would you break it? I am only in for one night.’ So I said ‘Well, call me back in two hours and I will see what I can do.’”
The president asked Dr. Biden to marry him 5 times before she finally agreed. She was rightfully concerned about the responsibility that comes with marrying a widower with 2 children.
”You have to remember, I mean, it wasn’t just my heart that was on the line, with Beau and Hunter, I knew that if we were gonna get married, it had to be forever because they had already lost their mother and sister in a car accident and I knew that they couldn’t lose someone else in their life. So here we are, it is forever, it is 48 years later,” Jill Biden said.
The couple was married on wed on June 17, 1977. On January 20, 2021, they became President and First Lady of the United States.
