“What Is My Goal?”: Inside the Tense Roundtable to “Define” Jill Biden’s Legacy

Biden’s Age • Roy Cohn’s Influence • West Wing Chaos [View in your browser]( | [Update your preferences](newsletter=vf) [Vanity Fair Hive logo image]( “What Is My Goal?”: Inside the Tense Roundtable to “Define” Jill Biden’s Legacy On this Presidents Day, we have an [exclusive excerpt]( from Katie Rogers’s American Woman, which goes inside first lady Jill Biden’s 2022 roundtable with historians in the East Wing to help carve out her niche. “A year-plus into this and only now are they trying to figure out what she is going to do with it?” one invitee recalls thinking. “It isn’t like she didn’t spend eight years watching a first lady at close range.” Plus, as we barrel toward a likely Joe Biden–Donald Trump rematch, we’re digging into the archives, revisiting Chris Smith’s prescient June 2023 [look]( at how Biden’s team planned to convince voters he’s up for another four years, along with David Kamp’s [moving piece]( on the president mourning the loss of son Beau. If you’ve forgotten the chaos of the first Trump administration, check out Sarah Ellison’s [feature]( on “The Westeros Wing,” or go back even further back with Marie Brenner’s [look]( at what a brash young real estate developer learned from Roy Cohn. Thanks for reading and we’ll be back in the news cycle churn tomorrow. [Image may contain: Jill Biden, Accessories, Jewelry, Necklace, Face, Head, Person, Photography, Portrait, Adult, and Earring]( [“What Is My Goal?”: Inside the Tense Roundtable to “Define” Jill Biden’s Legacy]( By [Katie Rogers]( [More than a year into her husband’s term, the first lady convened a panel of historians to help her carve out a niche. But the more advice they offered, as one invitee tells Katie Rogers in an excerpt of American Woman, the less well it was taken: “The meeting that I was in was not a fluff meeting.”]( [Read more button](   [Such a Fun Age]( By [Chris Smith]( [Inside the plan to convince voters that Joe Biden can handle four more years.]( [Read more button](   [Joe, Mourning]( By [David Kamp]( [In a cruel twist, Joe Biden’s planned 2016 presidential campaign was upended by the death of its foremost booster, his 46-year-old son, Beau, from brain cancer. Will the former vice president make a run in 2020?]( [Read more button](   [The Westeros Wing]( By [Sarah Ellison]( [In the cramped pressure cooker of the West Wing, with an unprecedented lack of leadership from the president, the knives are out. Talking to current and former Trump aides, Sarah Ellison maps the shifting power dynamic: Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner warring with Steve Bannon, a wounded Reince Priebus losing ground, and the vice president, Mike Pence, making the stealthiest moves of them all.]( [Read more button](   [Deal With the Devil]( By [Marie Brenner]( [In 1973, a brash young would-be developer from Queens met one of New York’s premier power brokers: Roy Cohn, whose name is still synonymous with the rise of McCarthyism and its dark political arts. At 27, Donald Trump took the ruthless attorney as his sometime guide, learning many of the tactics that would inexplicably propel him to the White House.]( [Read more button](   Get on the list Subscribe to our Hollywood newsletter for your essential industry and awards-season news, every day. [Sign Up Now](   [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [Instagram]( [LinkedIn](   This e-mail was sent to you by The Hive. To ensure delivery to your inbox (not bulk or junk folders), please add our e-mail address, vanityfair@newsletter.vf.com, to your address book. View our [Privacy Policy]( [Unsubscribe]( Sent from Condé Nast, 1 World Trade Center, New York, NY 10007 Copyright © 2024 Condé Nast