Joe Biden gets it right
On Navy Roberts.
On Friday, Joe Biden did the right thing.
In a statement to People magazine, he recognized Navy Roberts as his 7th grandchild.
“Our son Hunter and Navy’s mother, Lunden, are working together to foster a relationship that is in the best interests of their daughter, preserving her privacy as much as possible going forward,” Biden said.
He added: “This is not a political issue, it’s a family matter. Jill and I only want what is best for all of our grandchildren, including Navy.”
Yes — to all of that!
I have obviously been critical of the president on this issue. I wrote last week that the story of his refusal to acknowledge his 7th grandchild really bothered me since it seemed so directly opposed to the family man image that Biden has long cultivated.
And I wasn’t the only one. The issue had started to crop up on the campaign trail too. “Why don’t you spend some time with your granddaughter in Arkansas, or at least recognize her existence before you start worrying about our kids?” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis recently said on the stump.
Biden’s Friday statement puts him back in line with his long-held values.
Look, I don’t pretend any of this is easy. The relationship — such as it is — between Hunter Biden and Lunden Roberts has been decidedly contentious.
It wasn’t until late June that the two settled a child-support case.
But, at root, this story is about as 4 year old little girl who is utterly blameless in the chaos her parents have created around her. If she’s like all other 4 year olds I’ve ever met, she almost certainly doesn’t even care that her grandfather is the president. She just wants to have some sort of relationship with him.
Remember that the president — whether he wants to or not — sets an example for the country about how we should behave. (That fact makes Donald Trump’s conduct all the more problematic — but that’s a different column.)
Ignoring Navy’s existence was not the right thing to do. Joe Biden, to his credit, figured that out pretty quickly.1
None of that changes Hunter’s behavior, which, candidly, has been utterly awful in this whole thing. This paragraph — from a New York Times story on Navy — paints an ugly picture of the president’s son:
In mid-2018, Ms. Roberts was working as a personal assistant to Mr. Biden, according to a person close to her and messages from a cache of Mr. Biden’s files. Their daughter was born later that year, but by then, Mr. Biden had stopped responding to Ms. Roberts’s messages, including one informing him of the child’s birth date. Shortly after their daughter was born in November 2018, he removed Ms. Roberts and the child from his health insurance, which led Ms. Roberts to contact Mr. Lancaster.
Oomph.
But, Hunter is a grown man — and has to own his actions. All Joe Biden can do, as a dad, is love and support him. And love and support the child that was created amidst all of this.
Which is what he is now doing. Good on ya, Joe.
Some are cynical about Biden’s transformation on the issue. CNN political commentator Scott Jennings sarcastically congratulated Biden for acknowledging Navy, noting that “the polling must have been brutal.” I take a less cynical view of it — and am focused on the bottom line, which is that the little girl now will have a relationship with her grandfather.
Is it at all possible that Navy’s mom wanted to keep the press out of her daughter’s life during litigation & the President was honoring their wishes? Maybe he has had contact but since it’s none of our business, we all weren’t informed? How do you even know the little girl wants to hang with grandpa? Seems we’re always trying to paint everybody a rosy family portrait from our nostalgic childhoods. Let this family find its own way.
Has anyone ever been in a child support or related legal battle? You don't comment until everything is signed and sealed. It is painful. It is arduous. Once settled, you wait for guidance from the people involved -- hear the mother and father of Navy -- just as Jill and Joe Biden did. Joe Biden has shown over decades his commitment to his family. We have no reason to think he was shirking here. I have no doubt the whole family will embrace Navy as her parents feel will work best for her. Her mother may decide the political limelight isn't in Navy's best interest after all. That isn't Jill and Joe's decision, even moving forward.