JOE BIDEN Age on Inauguration Day 2021: 78 Entered race: April 25, 2019 Career: No current role. A University of Delaware and Syracuse Law graduate, he was first elected to Newcastle City Council in 1969, then won upset election to Senate in 1972, aged 29. Was talked out of quitting before being sworn in when … Read more
Priti Patel doesn’t like to dwell on the racism she used to experience as a child. ‘She doesn’t talk about it much,’ a close friend told me. ‘But she used to get a lot of name-calling at school and when she was out with her parents. She has told me it was pretty horrible.’ That was … Read more
What a shock it must have been for the Duke of Sussex to learn that his adopted host nation Canada would no longer foot part of the bill for his family’s police protection. How could this be? Harry’s and Meghan’s bestie, PM Justin Trudeau, had welcomed them warmly in December. And the country is a … Read more
There’s not a journalist in the land who hasn’t, at some time or another, asked this question: ‘Can I quote you on that?’ It invariably comes during a conversation with someone important who has said something pretty shocking. I had just such a conversation last week. It was with a senior, well-respected figure in the … Read more
Having endured the most harrowing ordeal of his life, financier Ben Goldsmith has received some joyful news at last. I can reveal that his wife, Jemima is expecting a baby. Ben confirms the news, telling me: ‘Our child is due in May.’ It comes seven months after his teenage daughter Iris was killed in a … Read more
One day, long after the worst of the coronavirus pandemic is behind us, historians may see the last few days as the moment when the world tumbled into the abyss. On Thursday, the head of the World Health Organisation declared that mankind stood at a ‘decisive point’. The world faced ‘a crisis, an epidemic that … Read more
The Queen has seen many things in her 68-year reign but she will never have witnessed anything like this. I can reveal that a three-year-old boy will be the best man at the wedding of her granddaughter Princess Beatrice. Bea’s fiance, Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi, has asked his son, Christopher [who is known as Wolfie], to do … Read more
As my mother lay on her deathbed, visitors who asked her how she was feeling would get one of three answers: ‘I’m very well, thank you’; ‘I’m blooming’; or, ‘I’m in the pink’. You didn’t have to be a consultant oncologist to realise this wasn’t strictly true. For one thing, she was so ill towards … Read more
Climate-change activists will not be the only ones celebrating the Court of Appeal’s decision to block a new third runway at Heathrow. It saves the Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who once threatened to lie down in front of the bulldozers, from having to make an embarrassing U-turn. It is a great victory for British Airways … Read more
Priti Patel has been Home Secretary for six months, almost to the day. She seems to be tough and demanding, which is exactly what we want — well, it is certainly exactly what I want — from the person who wields the big stick in one of the great offices of State at this perilous … Read more