The Biden family in Delaware
The Biden family has maintained deep roots in Delaware spanning more than five decades, shaping the state's political culture, legal history, and public consciousness in ways that extend well beyond any single generation. From Joe Biden's early career in Wilmington to the federal criminal proceedings against his son Hunter Biden conducted in a Delaware courtroom, the family's story is bound to the state in ways both intimate and consequential. Their presence has touched Delaware institutions ranging from the judiciary to the attorney general's office, and their personal struggles — including addiction, legal jeopardy, and domestic tragedy among those connected to the family — have played out in the full view of Delaware's courts and communities.
Background: The Biden Family's Connection to Delaware
Joe Biden's ties to Delaware began when he established himself as a young attorney and political figure in Wilmington during the late 1960s and early 1970s. He would go on to represent Delaware in the United States Senate for decades before serving as Vice President of the United States and ultimately as the 46th President of the United States. His family, including his wife Jill Biden, became fixtures of Delaware civic life, and the state itself became closely associated with the Biden name to a degree unusual even for prominent political families.
The influence of the Biden family within Delaware has been characterized as substantial and far-reaching. Commentary published in The Week magazine noted that the "power of the Biden family" in Delaware is "undeniable," a characterization supported by the family's decades-long presence in the state's political and legal institutions.[1] That influence has made Delaware a recurring setting for some of the most prominent legal and personal episodes in the family's history.
Jill Biden's Early Life and Marriage in Delaware
Before she became First Lady of the United States, Jill Biden was a resident of Wilmington who navigated a significant personal transition that would later draw renewed public attention. Jill Biden was married to William Stevenson from 1970 to 1975, a marriage that began and ended in Delaware.[2] After their divorce, Jill Biden went on to marry Joe Biden and eventually became among the most publicly recognized figures associated with the state.
William Stevenson himself remained in Delaware following the dissolution of the marriage. Decades later, Stevenson — identified as a 77-year-old resident of Wilmington — became the subject of serious criminal proceedings in the state. He was charged in connection with the death of his current wife, pleading not guilty to charges that he killed her in what prosecutors described as a domestic dispute at their Delaware home.[3][4] The case drew fresh media attention to Delaware and to the extended circle of individuals connected, however tangentially, to the Biden family's long history in the state. The Delaware Attorney General's office, led by Caroline Harrison, played a role in the proceedings.[5]
Hunter Biden and the Delaware Federal Trial
Perhaps the most consequential legal episode involving the Biden family in Delaware in recent years was the federal criminal trial of Hunter Biden, the president's son. The trial took place in a Delaware federal courtroom and drew national media coverage for the nature of its subject matter and the political prominence of the defendant's family.
Federal prosecutors presented what journalists described as a detailed and deeply personal account of drug use and a gun purchase at the center of the case. Specifically, prosecutors alleged that Hunter Biden made a federal firearm purchase while he was addicted to crack cocaine, a charge that put his well-documented struggles with addiction at the center of a criminal proceeding.[6] The proceedings forced the Biden family into a public reckoning with addiction, a subject that had previously been addressed most prominently through memoirs and public statements but had never before been litigated in a courtroom.
Coverage of the trial noted that the audiobook of a Biden family memoir was entered into the proceedings as evidence. A Scribd-archived publication noted that clips from the audiobook of Biden's memoir were played as part of courtroom arguments, underscoring how personal accounts intended for public audiences became legal artifacts in the Delaware case.[7]
Fox News coverage of the trial, broadcast in June 2024, included discussion of juror responses to the evidence and the broader national significance of the proceedings. A segment from the program America Reports on Fox News addressed juror reactions to the audio played during the trial, reflecting the degree to which the Delaware courtroom proceedings attracted sustained broadcast media attention.[8]
Addiction, Family, and Public Resonance in Delaware
The Hunter Biden trial and the broader public discussion of addiction within the Biden family had a particular resonance in Delaware, a state whose communities have not been immune to the national addiction crisis. Reporting by The New York Times illustrated this dynamic through the story of a Delaware family who saw their own experiences reflected in the Hunter Biden narrative. The piece described the "rage, secrecy and pain" that accompanies families torn apart by addiction, and documented how ordinary Delaware residents processed the public airing of a presidential family's private struggles.[9]
This resonance speaks to a broader truth about the Biden family's relationship with Delaware: because the family has been so embedded in the state for so long, their personal stories — including their most difficult chapters — tend to land differently in Delaware than they do in the rest of the country. For many Delaware residents, the Biden family's public struggles are not abstract political narratives but points of genuine personal identification and, in some cases, shared experience.
The addiction story that unfolded in the Delaware courtroom also prompted wider national conversations about how American families confront substance use disorder, the stigma associated with seeking help, and the particular pressures that public life places on family members who are not themselves seeking political office. Delaware, as the setting for these proceedings, became a kind of focal point for those national conversations during the summer of 2024.
The Biden Family and Delaware's Legal Institutions
The various legal proceedings connected to the Biden family have involved multiple layers of Delaware's legal infrastructure. The Delaware Attorney General's office has appeared in contexts connected to Biden-adjacent cases, and the federal court system based in Delaware has served as the venue for proceedings of national significance.[10]
Delaware's legal system is notable in its own right — the state is home to the Delaware Court of Chancery, which handles a disproportionate share of major American corporate litigation. The federal district court in Delaware, where the Hunter Biden proceedings took place, operates alongside this specialized court structure. That the Biden family's legal story unfolded in Delaware rather than in a Washington, D.C. courtroom or another jurisdiction is itself a reflection of the family's enduring rootedness in the state.
The involvement of Delaware's Attorney General's office in proceedings touching on Biden-connected individuals also illustrates the degree to which the state's legal institutions have been called upon to navigate matters with national political dimensions while operating as state-level institutions with their own procedural norms and obligations.
Legacy and Ongoing Significance
The Biden family's place in Delaware history is complex and continues to evolve. On one level, Joe Biden's political career represents the longest and most consequential public service legacy of any individual politician in the state's modern history. His rise from the Wilmington area to the presidency made Delaware a dateline of national significance for more than five decades.
On another level, the family's more recent legal entanglements have ensured that Delaware courts, prosecutors, and communities remain engaged with Biden-related matters even as the family's formal political tenure at the federal level concluded. The trial of Hunter Biden in a Delaware courtroom, the criminal proceedings involving Jill Biden's former husband in Wilmington, and the public attention these events generated all contributed to a portrait of the family as one whose ties to the state remain active and consequential across multiple dimensions of public life.
For Delaware as a state, the Biden family's story offers a case study in how deeply embedded political families shape local identity, legal institutions, and public culture — sometimes in ways that are celebratory and sometimes in ways that are sobering. The ongoing nature of that relationship, extending across generations and into the state's court system, ensures that the Biden family will remain a significant subject in any account of Delaware's recent history.