Meanwhile, long before Chris Coons became a senator from the state of Delaware, he was a

Capitol Hill intern for then Senator Joe Biden.

We spoke about their decades long friendship, the president's speech tonight, and much more when we sat down earlier today.

Senator Coons, welcome back to the news hour. Thanks for being here.

Great to be on with you.

Let's talk about your friend and this moment.

Because for someone who has spent 50 years of his life in public service, I think it's fair to say this is a complicated moment.

Yes.

When you talk to him, how is he viewing this moment right now?

Well, he's optimistic.

He's looking forward.

He believes that Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are the best chance we have to secure our democracy

When Joe announced he was running four years ago at the Democratic Convention when we kicked off the campaign against

Donald Trump, he focused on restoring the soul of our nation.

I'll remind you, we were in the middle of a terrible pandemic. It was a virtual convention. We were in the middle of a terrible pandemic it was a virtual convention

we're in the middle of an economic collapse and just two weeks before he took the oath of

office there was January 6th an assault on our democracy.

Tonight you're going to hear Joe Biden look back a little bit

on just how much he's had to pull us through.

I'm going to speak a little bit about how this man who's been knocked down by life so hard

several times helped us all get back up again and how his courage, his belief in democracy and belief in all of us

really is what underpins his incredibly selfless decision

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