By Bill Barlow
President Donald Trump’s connections to South Jersey are well known, from multimillion-dollar deals in Atlantic City starting in the 1980s to his visit to Wildwood last year for a rally at the beachfront Convention Center, the first visit to Cape May County by a sitting president since Benjamin Harrison had his “Summer White House” in Cape May in the 1890s.
Trump’s name was once plastered across the Atlantic City skyline, followed by a string of high-profile bankruptcies and intense clashes locally with media outlets, local contractors and other businesses. His was a household name locally long before The Apprentice or the Trump Tower-launch of his presidential bid, in which he quickly rose to the top of a Republican field crowded with more experienced candidates to clinch the GOP nomination to ultimately become the 45th American president.
Trump’s pugilistic style continued through his presidency, even after losing this year’s presidential race to Joe Biden. Trump has continued to claim victory, with little apparent basis in election law or math.
The Trump organization continues to hold extensive property in New Jersey, and throughout his presidency he has made multiple trips to his golf resort in Bedminster.
His successor seems like a study in sharp contrasts. While Trump has cultivated an image of opulence and luxury, before Barack Obama tapped him to become his running mate in the 2008 election, Biden was best known nationally as a senator who rode and Amtrack commuter train from Delaware to Washington.
While Trump’s first elected office was the presidency, Biden served decades representing Delaware in the Senate, being repeatedly reelected after his win in 1972. Multiple sources report he was one of the least wealthy members of the Senate for much of that time.
Biden has consistently emphasized his working-class roots, including his roots in Scranton, Pa., and spent decades representing Delaware. But he, too, has close ties to the Jersey Shore, albeit with a far lower profile the Trump’s.
His wife, Jill Biden, told NJ Monthly 2010 about her family weekends at her grandparents home in Hammonton and summers in Ocean City. For two summers, she worked as a waitress at Chris’ Seafood.
Her family continues to have a strong connection to Ocean City, where one of her sisters owns property.
After some sources raised concerns about security, Shore Local has decided not to include the name of Jill Biden’s sister.
Contacted on Monday, her sister declined to be interviewed for this story. She was making pies that morning, and said she could not talk because she was covered with flour. But when pressed about whether she would be able to speak at any time, she said she was advised not to.
She’s a well-known figure in the area in her own right, working for years at a local café, where the regulars have all known that she is the sister-in-law of the former vice president, now the president-elect.
The Biden family has vacationed in Ocean City after Biden’s term as vice president, keeping a very low profile. In a story for the Philadelphia Inquirer shortly before the election, writer Julia Terruso delved into Jill Biden’s Philly roots, including her shore connections.
Writing to NJ Monthly in 2010, Jill Biden stated that she still loves the beaches in Ocean City and Stone Harbor. She mentioned getting a thrill from meeting Bruce Springsteen at the inauguration.
Eight years ago, Joe Biden visited Seaside Heights to inspect the devastation of Sandy. Then the vice president, he described himself as a Jersey “Homeboy,” according to a news report from the time.
Biden met Jill Tracy Jacobs in 1975. His first wife and year-old daughter were killed in an automobile accident in December of 1972, shortly after his election to his first term in the Senate.
Jill was born in Hammonton and grew up in Willow Grove, Pa. her career has been in education, and she holds a doctorate from the University of Delaware along with other degrees. She also did some modeling work for an agency in Wilmington. She is believed to be the first spouse of a serving vice president to hold a paying job.
The next person in that position is set for far more firsts.
Doug Emhoff, poised to become the nation’s first husband of a vice president as well as the first Jewish spouse of a vice president. Kamala Harris’ husband has strong Jersey connections of his own, born in Brooklyn but growing up in the state before he moved to California at the age of 17.
Harris, a California Senator, is set for a stack of firsts of her own come the inauguration Jan. 20, 2021. She will be America’s first female vice president, the first black vice president and the first vice president of Asian descent.
She will not be the first person of non-European ancestry to serve in the office, however, although several reports have stated so. That distinction falls to Charles Curtis, who served as Herbert Hoover’s vice president. The Kansas Republican served multiple terms in the House of Representatives. The was a member of the Kaw nation for whom English was a second language, born when Kansas was still a territory.
Reports are that Jill Biden will also represent another White House first. She plans to continue to teach at Northern Virginia Community College after the inauguration, as she did while her husband served as vice president.
As of Nov. 23, Trump had not yet conceded the election, continuing to insist that he won the election even as his legal challenges were being thrown out of court. Many elected Republicans have continued to stand by him, although this week saw some stirrings of dissent, including from a Jersey voice.
Former Republican Gov. Chris Christie, a Trump rival for the presidential nomination who has been a consistent ally to the president since then, said on Sunday that it is time to end the fight and concede.
In a television interview, he described the legal team fighting the election results a :national embarrassment.”
