John Kerry Injured in Bicycle Accident; Beau Biden Passes Away
PAUL: Really difficult morning today for the family of vice president, Joe Biden. His 46-year-old son, Beau, passed away yesterday following a battle with brain cancer. And in a statement Biden called his son, "The finest man any of us have ever known." Joe Johns takes a look back at the life of Beau Biden.</s>BEAU BIDEN, JOE BIDEN'S SON: Good evening. I'm Beau Biden and Joe Biden is my dad.</s>JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Beau Biden was the eldest son of Vice President Joe Biden but also a public servant in his own right. A federal prosecutor in the late 1990s and Delaware's attorney general for eight years, leaving office just this past January. Born in Wilmington in 1969, his childhood was marred by a tragic car accident.</s>BEAU BIDEN: My mom took us to go buy a Christmas tree. On the way home, we were in an automobile accident. My mom, Neilia, and my sister, Naomi, were killed. My brother Hunter and I were seriously injured and hospitalized for weeks. I was just short of 4 years old. One of my earliest memories was being in that hospital, my dad always at our side.</s>JOHNS: Beau Biden and his father would remain close, even as the elder Biden became vice president.</s>BEAU BIDEN: I went out Saturday night with might have wife to a family -- a parent/teacher kind of thing on Saturday night and my mom and dad babysit. They babysit the weekend before.</s>JOHNS: As Delaware's A.G., Beau Biden took a special focus on prosecuting crimes against children and took his talent for the law into the military, serving for a year in Iraq as part of the judge advocate general corps.</s>JOSEPH BIDEN, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Today, I come as you prepare to deploy as a father, a father who got some sage advice from his son this morning -- dad, keep it short, we are in formation.</s>JOHNS: Biden had announced his intention to run for governor in Delaware in 2016, but has had recurring health problems, suffering a mild stroke in 2010, and admitted in 2013 to a Houston cancer hospital for a brain lesion.</s>SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Vice President Joe Biden's son, Beau Biden, was evaluated at a hospital. This is after what is being called an episode of disorientation and weakness.</s>JOHNS: Biden, 46, leaves a wife and two children.</s>PAUL: President Obama had this to say about Beau Biden. "For all that Beau Biden achieved in his life, nothing made him prouder, nothing made him happier, nothing claimed a fuller focus of his love and devotion than his family. Just like his dad."</s>BLACKWELL: Changing gears now, but staying in Washington. Some in the Capitol are deeply concerned about over China's escalated effort to reclaim territory in the disputed South China Sea. But the U.S. is refusing to recognize China's claims there. U.S. Secretary of Defense Ash Carter had stern words for China on Saturday. He called for an immediate and lasting halt to China's land reclamation in the sea.</s>ASH CARTER, SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: There should be no mistake, United States will fly, sail, and operate wherever international law allows, as U.S. forces do all over the world. America, alongside its allies and partners in the regional architecture, will not be deterred from exercising these rights, the rights of all nations. After all, turning an underwater rock into an airfield simply does not afford the rights of sovereignty or permit restrictions in international air or maritime transit.</s>BLACKWELL: Secretary of Defense Ash Carter. China has recently ramped its construction in the Spratly Islands there, raising concerns that it's trying to militarize the area.</s>PAUL: Well, the Guantanamo five prisoners swapped for American Bowe Bergdahl may be traveling today. We're talking about men who had ties to al Qaeda, even directly associated with Osama bin Laden. Authorities in the U.S. and Qatar are scrambling try to prevent this from happening. The latest in just a moment.