May 31st, 2015

Governor Jack Markell on Beau Biden: “…he was also just an incredibly good, real, genuine guy… And it’s just an unbelievable loss”

Today on CNN’s State of the Union, Governor Jack Markell (D-DE), joined chief national security correspondent Jim Sciutto to briefly discuss the loss of Vice President Joe Biden’s son, Delaware’s Attorney General, Beau Biden.

A transcript of the discussion is below

MANDATORY CREDIT: CNN’s “State of the Union”

FULL TRANSCRIPT

THIS IS A RUSH FDCH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN HOST: Joining us now as well is Governor Jack Markell of Delaware. He worked with Beau Biden when he took office in 2009. Biden, of course, was attorney general.

Governor Markell, thank you for joining us.

We know you are close to the Biden family. Have you been in touch with them? How are they doing?

GOV. JACK MARKELL (D-DE): Well, I have not spoken to them.

I would say everybody in Delaware is close to the Biden family. Their impact here has just been tremendous. And Beau was an extraordinary human being. I mean, he was a great attorney general. He took his job very seriously. But he was also just an incredibly good, real, genuine guy. And he was the most popular politician in the state.

And he earned that. And he worked for it. And it’s just an unbelievable loss.

SCIUTTO: He was a veteran himself as well of Iraq.

This is a loss, clearly, primarily for the Biden family. It’s also a loss for the Democratic Party, is it not, in the state of Delaware?

MARKELL: Well, it is.

And it — this goes so well beyond politics. I mean, I have heard from plenty of Republicans in the last 12 hours who are feeling the loss deeply. You know, it’s just — just deeper than any — than partisanship. He was well-respected in every part of the state.

And I spent a lot of time with him on some of the campaigns and then working with him. And this is a guy who was just really well- respected. He was a kind person. He was good-hearted. He was hardworking. He was the whole package.

SCIUTTO: This was a long battle, first dealing with it in 2013. Then he had a recovery and then a recurrence this year.

Did you have any sense of just how grave the situation was in recent days and weeks before his loss last night?

MARKELL: Not really.

You know, I spoke to Beau the last time in February, and I had invited him down to Washington to meet some of the other governors, because we all expected that Beau was going to run for governor next year. And had he wanted to run, he would have won and he would have served very capably.

And so we spoke back in February. It did not work on his schedule. And so I just, frankly, had no idea it was — that he — that this would happen.

SCIUTTO: Well, Governor Markell, we appreciate you joining us today. Our thoughts certainly with the family, with the Biden family, but also with the people of Delaware and all the people who knew him. So, thank you for taking the time.

MARKELL: Thank you very much. Bye-bye.

END INTERVIEW