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WASHINGTON (AP) – New First Lady Jill Biden made an unexpected detour through the United States Capitol on Friday to deliver baskets of chocolate chip cookies to members of the National Guard, thanking them “for keeping me, me and my family, safe ”at the inauguration of President Joe Biden.
“I just want to say thank you to President Biden and the entire Biden family,” she told a group of Guard members on Capitol Hill. “The White House baked you chocolate chip cookies,” she said, before joking that she couldn’t say she baked them herself.
Joe Biden was sworn in on Wednesday, exactly two weeks after Donald Trump supporters rioted on Capitol Hill in a futile attempt to prevent Congress from certifying Biden as the winner of the November presidential election. Extensive security measures were then taken for the inauguration, which proceeded without major incident.
Jill Biden told the group that her late son Beau was a member of the Delaware Army National Guard who spent a year deployed to Iraq in 2008-09. Beau Biden died of brain cancer in 2015 at the age of 46.
“So I am a mother of the National Guard,” she said, adding that the baskets were a “small thank you” for leaving their home state and coming to the nation’s capital. President Biden thanked the National Guard bureau chief in a phone call Friday.
“I really appreciate everything you do,” the first lady said. “The National Guard will always have a special place in the heart of all the Bidens.”
Jill Biden’s unannounced troop visit came after her first public outing as first lady.
She highlighted services for cancer patients at Whitman-Walker Health, a Washington institution with a history of service to HIV / AIDS patients and the LGBTQ community. The clinic receives federal funds to help provide primary care services in underserved areas.
Staff told the first lady that cancer screenings had declined since last March because patients did not want to enter due to the coronavirus pandemic. More and more patients are taking advantage of the options to see a doctor online.
When the issue of universal high-speed internet access was raised, Jill Biden, who is a teacher, said she heard from teachers across the country who were unable to reach their students due to the uneven access In certain regions.
“We just have to work together and solve some of these problems,” she said. “The first thing we need to do is fight this pandemic and get everyone vaccinated, go back to work and go back to their schools and bring things back to the new normal.”
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