DailyExpertNews
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President Joe Biden turns 80 this weekend, but the big party at the White House will be for a very different and more youthful occasion. Naomi Biden, Biden’s eldest granddaughter, is set to marry Peter Neal on the South Lawn of the White House on Saturday.
One day after the wedding, Biden will mark his place in American history as the only octogenarian president, a numerical milestone that draws attention to a key issue that has plagued Biden by his detractors: his age. Despite a flurry of recent victories — better-than-expected Democratic midterm elections, a relatively blunder-free trip to Egypt and Asia, and a lackluster presidential announcement from his old rival, Donald Trump — Biden can’t shake being the senior commander in chief . chief America has ever had.
But a gleaming wedding of two twenty-somethings kicking off a new chapter of life with music and dancing and revelry could put a youthful spin on 80th birthday weekend. Two people familiar with wedding planning say it wasn’t a coincidence that Naomi Biden’s wedding weekend coincides with President’s Day — the “age issue” is never something Biden wants to stress.
“The wedding provides some cover,” says one of the people.
The wedding, which DailyExpertNews is told will include the extended Biden clan on the guest list, as well as friends and family of the couple, will also be something of a kickoff for the tight-knit Bidens to start serious discussions about whether Joe Biden should run for a second term.
Shortly after the wedding, Jill Biden and Joe Biden travel to Nantucket, Massachusetts, for the Thanksgiving holiday; Christmas is fast approaching, as the clock ticks toward Biden’s need to say whether he’ll be in or out in 2024. Both the president and first lady have said they will weigh the pros and cons of a second run, something Biden has previously said he “intends” to undertake.
The wedding itself will be in three parts, a person familiar with the planning tells DailyExpertNews. The ceremony will take place at 11 a.m. ET on the South Lawn — a venue never before seen in the history of White House weddings. There will be no tent, the source confirms, which could make for a chilly outdoor morning; temperatures for Saturday are predicted in the mid 40s. After the exchange of vows, a smaller luncheon will be held at the White House for family and wedding parties only, and later in the evening, guests will return for an evening reception with dessert and dancing, which will also be held indoors.
In a way, Naomi Biden, 28, is experiencing a wedding at the White House, thanks in large part to her own insight. Biden, an associate at the Arnold & Porter law firm in Washington, D.C., urged her grandfather to run the first time.
Though the patriarch, Joe Biden has always involved his larger family circle, including his five eldest grandchildren, when weighing life choices. His sensitivity to their feelings and the invasive nature of a nasty political battle weigh heavily on his mind.
“I don’t think there’s been a decision, no matter how big or small, that we didn’t make as a family,” Naomi Biden said in a video interview played at the 2020 Democratic National Convention.
Though usually called by the older Biden family members, it was Naomi Biden who convened the most critical, personal, all-hands-on-deck family gathering, the one that would have the most impact on Joe Biden’s future. Biden was worried, but they weren’t.
“He thought we were having a meeting to discuss whether or not we wanted to [run,] but we really called it to say, ‘Get in that race! Hurry up!’” Naomi Biden said. In the years since, it was Naomi who spoke most openly on her social media channels about issues of democracy and defending her grandfather. On Nov. 12, she tweeted, “Democracy wins in the Senate. Never think that your vote doesn’t matter.”
Naomi is also the grandchild who is – literally – closest to her grandparents. She and Neal, 25, a recent graduate of the University of Pennsylvania Law School and who works at the Georgetown University Law Center on National Security, moved into the White House last August, a person familiar with the living situation tells DailyExpertNews.
The proximity of the couple’s wedding venue only increased their involvement in the planning. The wedding planner is Bryan Rafanelli, founder of Rafanelli Events, the source familiar with the details tells DailyExpertNews. Rafanelli is no stranger to throwing fantastic White House parties; he oversaw seven state dinners during Barack Obama’s presidency, including the administration’s final for Italy, which included a glass-ceiling tent on the South Lawn and a performance by Gwen Stefani.
He also planned and orchestrated Chelsea Clinton’s wedding in 2010.
A wedding produced by Rafanelli is not a cheap undertaking. The price tag for many of its events starts at around $300,000 and can run into the millions of dollars. “Consistent with other private events hosted by the First Family and following the traditions of previous White House weddings in previous administrations, the Biden family will pay for the wedding activities that take place at the White House,” said Jill Biden’s communications director. Elizabeth Alexander. DailyExpertNews.
Naomi’s father is Hunter Biden. Her mother is Kathleen Buhle. Her parents, who divorced in 2017, have each written memoirs about struggles in their relationship, many of which touched on Hunter Biden’s years-long battle with addiction.
Neal’s family hails from Jackson Hole, Wyoming, where the couple got engaged in September 2021. (The engagement ring contains the band from Neal’s grandmother’s engagement ring and was designed by a DC jeweler, a person with knowledge of the construction tells DailyExpertNews.)
The designer of Naomi Biden’s wedding dress has not yet been revealed, although several fashion insiders contacted by DailyExpertNews speculate that the job went to Ralph Lauren, arguably the most iconic American fashion designer today. Joe Biden has been supportive of Lauren’s suits, having worn one on inauguration day, and Jill Biden has also been photographed wearing the label. In March, Naomi and her sister, Finnegan, 23, and Neal attended Ralph Lauren’s fall 2022 fashion show in New York City, sparking most rumors that she will wear the designer for at least one of her wedding looks . The White House has not commented on the clothing speculation.
Photos from the wedding will be released to the press on Saturday afternoon, sometime between the morning ceremony and the evening reception, the person familiar with the schedule says.
Without a doubt, this year’s wedding will be the social event of the White House, perhaps of the entire Biden administration. It is only the 19th wedding ever at the White House, the last being for Obama’s chief photographer, Pete Souza, who married in 2013 at the Rose Garden. The last presidential daughter to celebrate a White House wedding was Jenna Bush in June 2008. Bush held her wedding and reception months earlier at the Bush family’s ranch in Texas, but her father, George W. Bush, received about 600 guests at the White House. Home for his daughter’s second reception.
But the scope and scale of the Biden wedding most closely resembles that of Luci Johnson, who held her reception in the East Room after marrying Patrick Nugent, and Lynda Johnson, who married Charles Robb in the East Room in 1967. Room of the White House. Tricia Nixon married Edward Finch Cox in June 1971 under a flower-laden white gazebo in the Rose Garden. All of these weddings were media catnip, with newspapers printing the recipes for the six-foot-tall wedding cakes.
Pieces of the Johnson daughters and Nixon’s pies were sent to the Smithsonian National Museum of American History. (Nixon hardened into a 2-inch by 2-inch piece that now looks like a dried sponge, according to the White House Historical Association.)
There’s no word yet on Biden’s cake taste, or whether, as with the aforementioned White House weddings, guests will take a piece home as a party favor at the end of the evening.
