Academic Appropriation? Joe Biden Claims He Attended 'Historically ...

Authored by Jonathan Turley,

A tape has surfaced of Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden bizarrely claiming that he “started” at a historically black college in speaking to supporters in South Carolina during the primary. Biden has never made any mention of going to Delaware State University and it is not clear why the many reporters in attendance at the event did not ask when he attended a HBCU. Indeed, he would be the first president to claim such a distinction. He might also have been inartfully referencing his start as a politician. Alternatively, this would seem like an academic version of cultural appropriation. It would seem a valid point of clarification for the media.

This story obviously created an immediate buzz among professors who tend to track academic credentials and associations of presidents and other leaders. It would certainly be a significant story if a president attended a HBCU but I am not sure what Biden meant by his statement.

Most obvious interpretation was that Biden was claiming to have been a student at Delaware State when he spoke at October 2019 town hall event held at the historic Wilson High School in Florence. The school was founded in 1866 by the Freedmen’s Bureau for Black children.  He stated “I got started out of an HBCU, Delaware State — now, I don’t want to hear anything negative about Delaware State,” Biden told the crowd, as shown on video. “They’re my folks.”