--- title: Vice President Joe Biden’s Bond With Late Son Beau Was Forged by Tragedy description: Beau Biden, the son of Vice President Joe Biden who died Saturday at the age of 46, was recently described by the vice president as... canonical: https://time.com/3902786/beau-biden-tragedy/ author: NBC News article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-05-31T23:52:49.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T07:46:16.663Z article:section: Politics og:title: Vice President Joe Biden’s Bond With Late Son Beau Was Forged by Tragedy og:description: Beau Biden, the son of Vice President Joe Biden who died Saturday at the age of 46, was recently described by the vice president as... og:url: https://time.com/3902786/beau-biden-tragedy/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte86a6a57d0a92b32/69885257f887dcd274e90b33/rtr21rh5.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2500 og:image:height: 1406 og:image:alt: Attorney General Beau and Vice Presidential candidate Senator Biden gesture on stage at the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Vice President Joe Biden’s Bond With Late Son Beau Was Forged by Tragedy twitter:description: Beau Biden, the son of Vice President Joe Biden who died Saturday at the age of 46, was recently described by the vice president as... twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte86a6a57d0a92b32/69885257f887dcd274e90b33/rtr21rh5.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Vice President Joe Biden's Bond With Late Son Beau Was Forged by Tragedy > Sponsored content. 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It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. by [NBC News](https://time.com/author/nbc-news/) ## NBC News May 31, 2015 11:52 PM UTC  Beau Biden with then Vice Presidential candidate Senator Joe Biden on stage at the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver, Colo. August 27, 2008. Beau Biden with then Vice Presidential candidate Senator Joe Biden on stage at the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver, Colo. August 27, 2008. Chris Wattie—Reuters by [NBC News](https://time.com/author/nbc-news/) ## NBC News May 31, 2015 11:52 PM UTC Beau Biden, the son of Vice President Joe Biden who died Saturday at the age of 46, was recently described by the vice president as his “redemption.” Along with his brother, Beau was the light in the terrible darkness that seemed inescapable in the face of Biden family tragedy more than 40 years ago. Biden’s first wife, Neilia, and 1-year-old daughter, Naomi, were killed in a Christmas time car accident in 1972, just weeks after Biden became the second youngest man elected to the Senate, according to [The Associated Press](https://web.archive.org/web/20080925021142/http:/www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/08/22/politics/p222636D16.DTL). Biden’s two sons, Beau, who was 3 years old at the time… [Read the rest of the story from our partners at NBC News](http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/vice-president-joe-bidens-bond-late-son-beau-was-forged-n367296?cid=par-time-article%5F20150531) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3902786/beau-biden-tragedy/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3902786/beau-biden-tragedy/"},"headline":"Vice President Joe Biden's Bond With Late Son Beau Was Forged by Tragedy","datePublished":"2015-05-31T23:52:49.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T07:46:16.663Z","description":"Beau Biden, the son of Vice President Joe Biden who died Saturday at the age of 46, was recently described by the vice president as...","url":"https://time.com/3902786/beau-biden-tragedy/","keywords":[],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte86a6a57d0a92b32/69885257f887dcd274e90b33/rtr21rh5.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"NBC News","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/nbc-news/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blte86a6a57d0a92b32/69885257f887dcd274e90b33/rtr21rh5.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Attorney General Beau and Vice Presidential candidate Senator Biden gesture on stage at the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver","caption":"Attorney General Beau and Vice Presidential candidate Senator Biden gesture on stage at the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver","creditText":"Chris Wattie—Reuters","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3902786/beau-biden-tragedy/","name":"Vice President Joe Biden's Bond With Late Son Beau Was Forged by Tragedy"}}]}] ```