Jill Biden, the wife of former President Joe Biden, has written a new book called “View from the East Wing.” The picture shows her performing in New York.Image: keystone
The former first lady has written a book about the dramatic 2024 election campaign – to the annoyance of many Democrats. The ex-president’s wife is now unpacking in Washington.
June 7, 2026, 10:52 p.mJune 7, 2026, 10:52 p.m
Renzo Ruf, Washington DC
It’s a good day for Jill Biden. The former first lady celebrates her 75th birthday this Wednesday. Joe, the husband, is doing well under the circumstances; his incurable cancer is under control.
And the audience to whom she wants to speak about her new book in Washington is well disposed towards her. Jill even recognizes some old acquaintances in the historic synagogue: Hedieh, who was responsible for the flower arrangements in the White House. Or the nameless butler who gave her a glass of wine when she came “home” exhausted.
That helps. Today Jill Biden also has to provide information about what is probably the darkest moment of her political life: the dramatic days in the early summer of 2024, when then-President Joe Biden was forced to give up his candidacy for a second term after a desolate performance in a TV debate with Donald Trump. It’s been two years now, and most Democratic party members actually don’t want to talk about this episode anymore.
But Jill has a book to sell.
So, after a few tame introductory questions from the moderator, she comes to talk about that evening on which Joe’s dreams vanished into thin air: “This disastrous debate.” Jill says they were traveling separately in the days before the TV duel. He was preparing for his Republican opponent, she was campaigning. When she finally saw Joe again in a hotel room in Atlanta a few hours before the television show began, she immediately noticed how “terrible” he looked. The 81-year-old’s face was “strangely monochromatic,” she writes in her book. Joe himself is said to have said in a hoarse voice: “I’m not feeling very well.”
Doctors reportedly examined Biden after the debate
Jill apparently brushed aside these objections. “It will be okay,” she believed. Joe usually thrives when he sees the spotlight, she tells the audience.
Not this evening.
Jill explains how she panicked when the president made nonsensical statements on television. “My goodness,” she thought to herself, “what’s going on?” She seriously had the feeling that Joe was having a stroke, she says. That’s what it says in the book too. “I was so scared!”
The audience listens breathlessly. And no one seems to be wondering why the wife of the world’s most powerful man – whose aging issues were one of the dominant campaign themes – watched for nearly 90 minutes while Joe Biden supposedly had a medical emergency.
Jill Biden hugs after botched TV debate on April 27th June 2024 her husband Joe. image: getty
At the end of the debate, Joe is said to have frankly said: “I really fucked up.” But Jill doesn’t want to talk about the cause of this failure publicly even two years later. Of course, Joe was examined immediately by the doctors who constantly accompany the President. They wouldn’t have found anything. “They said, Jill, he’s fine.” And that’s why she still has no idea what happened during the TV duel. “It’s not like we’re keeping a secret. We simply don’t know,” she says.
At the end there is a birthday serenade
Elsewhere, the loyal politician’s wife says: The pressure that Joe was exposed to in the days after the debate, and which ultimately led to his withdrawal, was “overwhelming”. She suggests that at the time she felt he shouldn’t have given up. And that after 50 years of public service, he deserved the support of his party.
The audience seems to have the same opinion. The loudest applause probably goes to Jill when she tells how she told Joe the morning after the debate: “Stand up! We won’t let one debate shape your entire career.”
When the audience has the opportunity to ask questions, no one wants to know whether it might have been better if Jill had waited until after the election in November to publish her book – because many Democrats would rather look forward and talk about the current president. Instead, the presenter uses the last minute of the event to sing a birthday serenade for the former First Lady.
750 people sing “Happy Birthday”. And Jill Biden is smiling. (aargauerzeitung.ch)