South Carolina in Focus as ‘Draft Biden’ Gains Steam

It’s not just because Iowa was Joe Biden’s Waterloo in 2008, the last time he ran for president. Or because Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders will have New Hampshire pretty well carved up this time around.

Or because the vice president long ago won the affections of two divergent pillars of South Carolina politics by delivering the eulogy for the state’s longtime Republican Senator Strom Thurmond, and bonding with his former Democratic colleague, Senator Fritz Hollings. Or because the Bidens love to vacation on Kiawah Island, where they just spent a week with family, recovering from the loss of the vice president’s son, Beau. Before dying of brain cancer in May, Beau reportedly encouraged his father, who is now 72, to take another shot at the White House.