Joe Biden mounted two previous presidential bids in 1988 and 2008, never making it out of the Democratic primaries. Born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, Biden has been a fixture in Democratic national politics since he won an upstart campaign to become a U.S. senator from Delaware in 1972. Biden represented the country at international summits, and was among those in the Situation Room the night that Navy SEALs killed Osama bin Laden.