The Biden's beach house in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. (Google maps)
Drivers in northern Delaware have become familiar with the “Biden backup” created by the Secret Service entourage whisking President Joe Biden from the New Castle Airport to his home in Greenville. His trip home this past Friday afternoon caused some significant delays for drivers heading out for their own holiday weekend travel.
Now, folks living in and visiting the Rehoboth Beach area will get a taste of what it’s like for a world leader to be in town.
“It is amazing the protective measure they take these days for the president,” Delaware Gov. John Carney said recently. “It is a burden to bear, but we get a lot more positive out of our first Delawarean to become President of the United States.”
Biden is due to arrive at the beach house he bought in 2017 just after 6 p.m. Wednesday. Drivers in the area can expect streets to be shuttered in the area around that time as the presidential motorcade delivers the Bidens to their home.
Traffic typically gets backed up in and around Rehoboth during the busy summer season, but the number of visitors should be relatively low this early in June.
The trip coincides with First Lady Jill Biden’s birthday on June 3.
While not exactly beachfront, the Bidens’ house does have ocean views. It’s separated from the ocean by the Gordons Pond area of Cape Henlopen State Park.
As a result of that close proximity to one of the state’s most popular parks, the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control announced Tuesday that the Gordons Pond parking lot, the pavilion, beach area, and surf fishing vehicle crossing will be closed through Friday as part of “a security event coordinated among local, state and federal authorities.”
DNREC officials say the southernmost portions of the Gordons Pond trail will also be closed to the public intermittently through Friday.
Just a few days after celebrating his election victory with thousands of supporters in Wilmington, the Bidens hit the trail at Cape Henlopen, riding their bikes along the park’s paved trails before meetings with the transition team.
Biden is expected to be in Rehoboth until Friday.
It’s been a busy two weeks of travel between D.C. and Delaware for the Bidens.
They were in Wilmington for the Memorial Day weekend as President Biden continued his decades-long tradition of attending a service at War Memorial Plaza in New Castle to honor troops who died in the line of duty.
This year’s service on Sunday was especially poignant as it coincided with the anniversary of the death of Beau Biden, one of the president’s two sons. Before attending the Memorial Day event, the family attended a memorial mass at St. Joseph on the Brandywine church, where Beau is buried.
He briefly returned to Delaware earlier last week to pay his respects to former longtime staffer Norma Long. Long served as Biden’s scheduler for more than 30 years during his time in the U.S. Senate. Biden was in Delaware for less than two hours to attend the viewing on Tuesday, May 25.