Chapter 20
We hosted several hundred events a year at the White House, everything from a small military retirement party or a Make-A-Wish child visit to state dinners for hundreds of people in formal dress.
Regardless of the size of the group, photos and handshakes were part of the schedule.
At larger events, the photo lines were typically three hundred people plus.
I developed terrible wrist pain from shaking so many hands a day.
There were times when to keep going I’d have to run upstairs and plunge my hand into a bucket of ice (a trick Hillary Clinton taught me).
We tried to move things along quickly, but Joe, as I’ve said before, wanted to talk to everyone for hours.
He’d grown immune over the years to my let’s move it along throat-clearing and arm-squeeze signals.
Social aides often had to swoop in to encourage lingering guests with a friendly “This way, sir…” Thank God for the social aides.
Of course, there is nothing more elegant than a state dinner.
The White House staff outdoes itself to make everything beautiful, and the presence of world leaders and celebrities creates a buzz of excitement.
As First Lady, you must make dozens of choices—every color, every flower, every course.
Everything is scripted down to the minute, and every decision is sure to be dissected both by guests and by the press.
I was so fortunate to have Carlos Elizondo, the White House social secretary, as my partner.
We had worked together for eight years when Joe was vice president.
I told Carlos that if Joe were ever elected president, he would be my first call. And he was.
Inevitably, someone still complains about something being too this or too that.
Some people are mad that they can’t bring their whole families.
Others arrive in the room and decide that their table doesn’t have enough star power, then have the audacity to switch place cards or to put in elaborate requests: “I don’t want so-and-so in my line of sight.
” The power plays amaze me, as does the extent to which visitors covet anything with the presidential seal on it.
They often tuck a few extra White House paper towels into their purse as a remembrance.
God forbid you’re the last one in the ladies’ room—there are often none left to dry your hands!
Something always required reshuffling. At the India state dinner in June 2023, we thought we’d be safe with a vegetarian menu, but there were dozens of last-minute requests for vegan, dairy-free, and garlic-free meals.
The kitchen had its hands full adjusting plates to meet the guests’ needs.
We found out last minute that the chandeliers we’d rented for the Australian dinner in October 2023 were too heavy for the tents we’d planned to hang them in, and we wound up having to arrange for new lighting.
At one state dinner, the visitors from Africa hadn’t been given enough time to overcome jet lag, so they were falling asleep at the table. I asked the staff to speed the courses along as quickly as possible so that the guests could finish their meals and go straight to bed.
The first state dinner I hosted, for France, in December 2022, was so effervescent, it felt as though we could have kept the party going until dawn.
The decor was red, white, and blue, for our shared national colors.
The guest list was a mix of dignitaries and cultural figures.
I invited Tara Westover, the author of Educated, and sat her and her boyfriend at my table.
Emmanuel Macron sat to my right. He was a great dinner partner—chatty and interesting—and kept the conversation going.
The brilliant Jon Batiste performed, and brought the house down with one of my favorite of his songs, “Cry.” His whole family came, and they had everyone dancing in the aisles.
I’d done countless tastings to arrive at the menu.
It was important to me that the food not be messy to eat.
I thought of the woman who buys a beautiful dress and winds up with sauce all over it.
Forget about leafy frisée salads covered in dressing.
You had to be able to get it in your mouth in one bite.
I also had to make sure the wines paired well, which often meant trying a flight of wines alongside the food samples at ten in the morning.
We wound up serving butter-poached Maine lobster and coulotte of beef.
I went back and forth on whether to serve a pre-dessert cheese plate per French tradition.
In the end, I did that, only with American cheeses.
The French seemed to enjoy those more than the California wines.
When it came to picking my outfit, Bailey Moon was my stylist, and my trusted longtime aide Jordan Montoya kept me true to myself.
We worked with designers to find something culturally appropriate—so, no white if the country we’re hosting is India, China, or Japan, as white symbolizes death in those cultures.
Sometimes I was told by the State Department that I should wear something specific for a particular cultural event.
For the French dinner, I wore a navy off-the-shoulder Oscar de la Renta gown designed by Laura Kim and Fernando Garcia.
You really never knew what would happen at a state dinner, in spite of all the formality and preparation. In April 2023, the South Korean president wound up coming onstage to sing—impeccably—one of his favorite songs, “American Pie.”
In May 2024, I hosted the first-ever Teachers of the Year state dinner, and I loved every minute of it.
Fifty-five teachers attended, with representatives from each state and territory.
As a teacher of forty years, I feel a strong connection to all the educators I meet.
We talk the same language. We know the challenges, but we’re teachers because of the joys.
The centerpieces were book-themed. Golden apples were scattered on the tables.
The vases were made from pencils. The featured flower was the iris, the Tennessee state flower—a nod to the National Teacher of the Year, Missy Testerman, an ESL specialist at Rogersville City School in a rural Appalachian community.
We surprised the teachers with handwritten notes from their students, colleagues, and administrators.
Another surprise was an appearance from Joe, who told the educators that they were the kite strings keeping our national ambitions aloft.
At the dinner, I announced our administration’s efforts to improve teacher pay and enable Public Service Loan Forgiveness. I gave each teacher being celebrated a brass bell.
In my remarks, I explained:
“When I was a little girl, my grandmother would sometimes take me to school with her, a one-room schoolhouse in a small town in South Jersey. She loved her work, and her students loved her in return. And she used to call her students to class with a big brass bell. When she died, she didn’t leave behind a giant estate.
But what I inherited from her—what I still have to this day—is that bell.
And I sometimes think about the way her legacy resonated into the world like waves of sound, changing those who heard its ring…
Today, all of you ring your own bell—pulling each person you teach into a harmony that never ends. ”
I could hardly contain my excitement when I knew the strolling military chorus and strings were about to enter the room.
“Take out your phones!” I told the teachers. “Something’s about to happen that you won’t want to miss!” They filmed and cheered as the musicians wove in and out among the tables playing “Brave” and “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough.”
A first course of apple, walnut, and celery root salad was served, then lobster ravioli as a main course.
To finish, White House executive pastry chef Susie Morrison made a dessert trio of coconut custard cake, apple mousse, and strawberries with cream.
I’ll never forget that night; it was pure joy.
I’d never felt prouder to be an educator.
Our November 2024 dinner was held as a farewell to thank four hundred of the supporters who’d made Joe’s term possible. We hadn’t been able to fete them at the inauguration because of the pandemic.
The brilliant event planner Bryan Rafanelli created something truly incredible, putting up a clear-topped tent around the South Lawn fountain, enclosing it, and filling the space with globes of light and setting masses of pink roses standing up all the way around the fountain.
The Secret Service initially blocked lines of sight as a precaution, but we worked with them to open up the back wall so that diners could see the monuments. It was magnificent.
In my toast to Joe, I said, “It’s hard to believe that we’re in the final moments of this extraordinary journey together…
Joe, throughout your life in public service, you’ve put people at the center.
So it’s never a surprise to see people gather around you.
Four years ago, you set out to restore the soul of the nation.
It was never just a sound bite; it was your drumbeat.
Your wisdom and steady hand lifted our country out of a pandemic, set our economy on solid ground, and fortified our hope for what is possible.
You led with an unshakable belief in the goodness of the American people and guided us on a new and brighter course.
All the while, you continued to be a brother, an uncle, a friend, a partner, and a father and grandfather whose devotion can be measured by the calls that you fit between bilateral meetings and security briefings—just to check in and say ‘I love you.’ What I’ve watched you do for more than forty years is extraordinary.
What you’ve done over the last four years is breathtaking.
” I handed him a flute of ginger ale. “Please join me in raising a glass to your president—my husband and hero—Joe Biden.”
With Joe at the helm, the country was a kinder place.
In an atmosphere of compromise and compassion, I saw the nation healing.
When I look back on my years at the White House, working in rooms that no longer exist, I see them as if inside a snow globe—this magical place filled with people trying to keep traditions alive.
For posterity, it feels important to describe what life in the White House was like, before things changed.