- President-elect Joe Biden's younger sister, Valerie Biden Owens, has managed his seven senatorial campaigns, as well as two of his previous presidential campaigns, per Frontline.
- “She has been my best friend my entire life," Biden wrote of Owens in his memoir.
- Here's what you need to know about Valerie, a pivotal part of the future president's life.
President-elect Joe Biden began his victory speech by thanking the Delawareans who have supported him throughout his career—including his sister, Valerie Biden Owens. She was present at the celebratory event along with Biden's other loved ones, including his wife of 40 years, Dr. Jill Biden; his children, Hunter and Ashley; and his seven grandchildren, who inspired him to run for president.
Biden has said that family is integral to him, and his younger sister is one of the people who has been by his side the longest. “She has been my best friend my entire life," Biden wrote of Owens, 74, in his memoir Promises to Keep.
Biden is the oldest of four siblings born to a Catholic family in Scranton, PA, per Biography. Owens, the family's second child and only female, has been an instrumental part of Biden's political career. She managed his seven straight senatorial campaigns in Delaware (all victorious), and two of his presidential campaigns in 1988 and 2008, per Frontline.
Speaking to Insider in 2020, Owens said that her older brother was a big dreamer—and that he always took her along for the ride. "From the time I can remember, I opened my eyes, and he was there. He put out his hand and said, ‘Come on, Val. We’ve got things do and people to see and places to go,'" Owens recalled.
Now, Owens finds herself at the door of the White House, with her older brother as always. Here's what you need to know about one of Biden's closest confidantes.
After a fatal car accident, Valerie helped Joe raise his sons.
Owens was with Biden the day he got the phone call that would change his life forever—in fact, she was the one who answered the phone, per Biography. In 1972, shortly after Biden won his first Senate race, Biden's wife, Neilia, was driving their three children to get a Christmas tree. The car was struck by a truck. Biden's wife and infant daughter, Naomi, were killed in the accident; their sons, Hunter and Beau, were in the hospital with injuries.
Following the accident, Owens quit her job as a teacher and moved in with Biden and his sons. In his memoir Promises to Keep, Biden elaborates on the instrumental role Owens played in holding the family together. She "was the cornerstone that allowed me to sustain and then rebuild my family. When Neilia died, my sister was the person I trusted completely with my sons.”
By caring for his sons, Owens allowed Biden to begin his Senate career. Biden commuted between Washington, D.C. and Delaware daily; Owens kept the home running for four years, per the Washington Post.
“It was a gift,” Owens told the New York Times in 2008. “I got to practice on Beau and Hunter before I screwed up my own kids," she joked. In a 2020 New York Times interview, she said, “That was nothing heroic. It was exactly what my brother would have done for me. It was called family.”
Valerie's husband, John T. Owens, is Joe's best friend from law school.
In his memoir, Biden touches on the friendly intervention he took in his sister's love life. After graduating from the University of Delaware, Valerie married a man named Bruce Saunders. When their marriage didn't work out, Biden introduced her to her next husband—his best friend from Syracuse Law School, John "Jack" Owens. Today, Jack works as a lawyer and a businessman, per the New York Times.
Valerie and Jack had actually met on a blind date before her first marriage, facilitated by Biden and his then-girlfriend, Neilia. "I promise you, Valerie, if I could pick any guy in the world for you, it would be Jack Owens,” Neilia said. According to Biden, the date was a disaster. Valerie and Jack's bickering throughout Biden's first senate campaign didn't improve the relationship. From then on, "they steered clear of each other," Biden wrote.
They finally got together in the aftermath of the deadly car accident. "In a strange way Neilia's death brought Jack and Val together," Biden wrote in his book. Valerie was won over by watching Jack be "such a good friend” to her brother.
Today, they have three children, per her bio. Their first child, a daughter, was born while the couple was still living with Joe and his sons, per a feature in Tortoise Media.
Valerie Biden Owns ran many of Joe Biden's political campaigns, but not the most recent.
Valerie has run Biden's political campaigns throughout his career—including his campaign for high school class president, and his bid for Senate at age 29. Speaking to Frontline in 2020, Owens recalled some of her tactics from that first low-budget campaign, including enlisting neighborhood kids to hand-deliver 360,000 informational newspapers throughout the state, because they didn't have money for stamps. "I wasn't building a resume for a political future. I was building the campaign for Joe," Owens recalled of the campaign.
“Val is kind of the connective tissue throughout the course of the campaigns from '72 to today," deputy campaign manager Kate Bedingfield told BuzzFeed News in 2020, referring to her as Biden's "emotional guardrails."
A 2008 New York Times profile shows just how long, and how consistently, Valerie has held this position. “She is absolutely his political alter-ego and confidante,” David Wade, Mr. Biden’s press secretary, said.
Her position changed for Biden's most recent bid for president, in which she held no formal role. “This is the first time I haven’t managed the campaign, and I want to tell you, it’s damn frustrating!” Valerie said at a campaign stop in 2020, per BuzzFeed News.
Still, she remained heavily involved in the journey, and was one of the voices encouraging him to run and keep his spirits up when the campaign took hits. "She was there beginning, middle and end; morning, noon and night,” Sen. Christopher A. Coons, who knows the Biden family, told The Washington Post. "She respects and admires him, and she helps him be his best self. But she can also look him in the eye and say, ‘Don’t do this.’ She can tell him the stuff that nobody wants to hear. Because you can’t fire your sister.”
Valerie has an impressive and independent career of her own.
When she isn't overseeing her brother's political ascent, Owens keeps busy. Over the years, Owens has applied her political acumen to nurture other careers.
“She has essentially mentored a whole generation or two of aspiring political leaders in our state,” former Delaware governor Jack Markell (D) told The Washington Post. “She’s a very, very clear communicator. She says it exactly like it is. You don’t have to spend a lot of time guessing.”
According to her official bio, Owens served as the Executive Vice President of Joe Slade White and Company, a media consulting firm that works with political candidates, from 1997 to 2016. Valerie's work has brought her around the world. In 2016, she served as U.S. Senior Advisor to the United Nation, and has worked with Women’s Campaign International. She’s also been a leader within the Democratic National Committee, serving on the National Board of the Women’s Leadership Forum.
Fittingly, she is the vice chair of the Biden Institute at the University of Delaware, and is the vice chair of the Biden Foundation. After all, for the Bidens, it's always been a family affair.
For more ways to live your best life plus all things Oprah, sign up for our newsletter!
