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President Joe Biden holds a copy of the Republican Study Committee's FY2024 budget proposal as he speaks about his administration's economic agenda during an event at Prince George's Community College in Largo, Md., Sept. 14, 2023. (AP) President Joe Biden holds a copy of the Republican Study Committee's FY2024 budget proposal as he speaks about his administration's economic agenda during an event at Prince George's Community College in Largo, Md., Sept. 14, 2023. (AP)

President Joe Biden holds a copy of the Republican Study Committee's FY2024 budget proposal as he speaks about his administration's economic agenda during an event at Prince George's Community College in Largo, Md., Sept. 14, 2023. (AP)

Louis Jacobson
By Louis Jacobson September 19, 2023
Amy Sherman
By Amy Sherman September 19, 2023

What Biden omits in his repeated claim about teaching at the University of Pennsylvania

If Your Time is short

  • President Joe Biden served as a professor of practice at the University of Pennsylvania starting in 2017. His duties went on for about two years instead of four because he went on unpaid leave in 2019 to run for president.

  • Biden’s role involved panel discussions and other public appearances, but not classroom teaching.

  • Learn more about PolitiFact's fact-checking process and rating system.

President Joe Biden likes to tell stories about his past that at times are exaggerations, wrong or misleading.

He made a Pants on Fire claim that he was "arrested with our U.N. ambassador on the streets of Soweto trying to get to see (Nelson Mandela) on Robben Island." He falsely said, "I’ve been in and out of Iraq and Afghanistan over 40 times." On 9/11’s 22nd anniversary, Biden falsely said "Ground zero in New York — I remember standing there the next day." Biden was at ground zero nine days after the attacks.

In remarks Sept. 14 at Prince George’s Community College in Largo, Maryland, Biden repeated something he previously said about his time at the University of Pennsylvania. 

"Our democracy is under attack, and we got to fight for it," Biden said. "I taught at the University of Pennsylvania for four years, and I used to teach political theory. And, folks, you always hear every generation has to fight for democracy." 

Is Biden right about teaching for four years at the University of Pennsylvania?

We asked the university for more information, but did not hear back.

A White House spokesperson pointed PolitiFact to a university webpage that said Biden was a presidential professor of practice from 2017 to 2021. Nothing on that page mentions any curriculum or topics Biden covered at the University of Pennsylvania. But we know he served in this role for about two years, not four, and his duties generally involved speaking events, not typical classroom teaching.  

Biden’s professorship duties 

The University of Pennsylvania named Biden as Benjamin Franklin Presidential Professor of the Practice in early 2017, after his vice presidency ended.

The university’s faculty handbook says a practice professor’s "primary" activity is teaching, but the job may also involve supervising independent studies and internships, serving on committees and attending school faculty meetings.

Biden served in his position for about two years because he went on leave for his 2020 presidential campaign. Biden was paid more than $900,000 for this university role from 2017 to 2019, according to tax forms he’s filed.

Shortly after Biden’s University of Pennsylvania appointment was announced in 2017, Kate Bedingfield, then a Biden campaign spokesperson, told the university newspaper The Daily Pennsylvanian that Biden would not be teaching regular classes.

The Philadelphia Inquirer reported in 2019 that Biden’s post "involved no regular classes and around a dozen public appearances on campus, mostly in big, ticketed events."

The Daily Pennsylvanian tallied several of Biden’s university appearances:

  • Biden participated on a February 2017 panel about the fight to cure cancer with Penn President Amy Gutmann and medical experts. 

  • In March 2017, Biden joined Gutmann for a question-and-answer session on topics ranging from international policy related to China and Russia to President Donald Trump. 

  • In September 2017, former Mexican President Felipe Calderón sat down with Biden to discuss their personal relationship and the ties between their countries.

  • In a November 2017 onstage interview with the dean of Penn’s communication school, Biden discussed his memoir, "Promise Me, Dad," which followed the death of his son Beau. Biden told the students that there had never been a conflict for him between his personal and political lives. "All politics is personal, it’s about understanding the other guy. The same values I brought to raising my family and later them raising me are the same values I bring to my public life."

In 2019, Biden participated in a university panel discussion on the opioid epidemic.

"People show up in the emergency room with a sprained ankle, 25% of them get an opioid prescription," Biden said during the discussion. We rated his statement Mostly True.

PolitiFact previously asked the University of Pennsylvania about the differences between Biden’s position and those of rank-and-file full professors.

"Penn has many different models of professorships," Ron Ozio, the university’s media relations director, told PolitiFact. "Not all are tenure-track and involve teaching regular classes. Some are clinicians, some are researchers, and others are professors of the practice, the category that applied to President Biden."

Ozio said in 2022 that Biden helped expand the university’s global outreach "while sharing his wisdom and insights with thousands of Penn students through University-wide events, talks and classroom visits."

A White House spokesperson also told PolitiFact that Biden was a constitutional law adjunct professor at Widener University-Delaware Law School for 17 years. That was from 1991 to 2008, when he resigned to accept Barack Obama’s offer to join the Democratic ticket as his vice presidential running mate.

Our rating

Biden said, "I taught at the University of Pennsylvania for four years."

Biden served as a "professor of the practice" at the University of Pennsylvania. Although the university lists his service from 2017 to 2021, his position was closer to two years because he was on unpaid leave while running for president.

Biden’s role involved panel discussions and other public appearances, but not classroom teaching. 

We rate his statement Half True.

RELATED: All of our fact-checks of Joe Biden

Our Sources

White House, Remarks by President Biden on Bidenomics | Largo, MD, Sept. 14, 2023

C-SPAN, President Biden Delivers Remarks in Maryland on the Economy, Sept. 14, 2023

Widener University, Before He Was Mr. President, He Was Professor Biden to His Widener Law Students, Jan. 20, 2021

Snopes, Did Biden Teach Constitutional Law for 21 Years? Oct. 16, 2020

University of Pennsylvania, Joe Biden, Accessed Sept. 15, 2023

Telephone interview,  Jon Paul DeMarco, former student of Joe Biden, Sept. 15, 2023

Email interview, Olivia Dalton, White House spokesperson, Sept. 15, 2023

White House, remarks by Joe Biden at North Carolina A&T State University, April 14, 2022

University of Pennsylvania, faculty handbook, accessed April 22, 2022

University of Pennsylvania, "A Message to the Penn Community Regarding Vice President Joe Biden," April 30, 2019

University of Pennsylvania, Joe Biden biography, accessed April 21, 2022

University of Pennsylvania, Jeb Bush biography, accessed April 21, 2022

Philadelphia Inquirer, "Penn Has Paid Joe Biden More than $900K since He Left the White House. What Did He Do to Earn the Money?" July 12, 2019

Daily Pennsylvanian, "No One Is Really Sure What Joe Biden Will Be Doing at Penn," Feb. 28, 2017

Daily Pennsylvanian, "Joe Biden Came to Penn for the Fourth Time in 2018. Here’s His Role on Campus, Explained," Dec. 11, 2017

Daily Pennsylvanian, "Jeb Bush just became Penn’s second presidential professor of practice. Here’s what that means," Sept. 20, 2018

Daily Pennsylvanian, "Biden’s Claim of Being a "teacher" at Penn Drew Scrutiny. Here’s What His Role Really Was," April 17, 2020

Daily Pennsylvanian, "Photo Essay: A look back at Joe Biden’s visits to Penn since becoming a professor," Feb. 20, 2019

Tax Notes, presidential tax returns archive, accessed April 21, 2022

Snopes.com, "Was Biden a ‘Full Professor’ at the University of Pennsylvania?" April 15, 2022

Email interview with Kelly Benjamin, spokesperson for the American Association of University Professors, April 19, 2022

Email interview with Ron Ozio, director of media relations for the University of Pennsylvania, April 19, 2022

YouTube, Clip of Joe Biden on Parks and Recreation

PolitiFact, Fact-checking Joe Biden on being a full professor for four years, April 22, 2022

PolitiFact, Joe Biden’s Pants on Fire claim about his arrest in South Africa, March 4, 2020

PolitiFact, Joe Biden visited ground zero nine days after 9/11, not ‘the next day’ Sept. 12, 2023

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What Biden omits in his repeated claim about teaching at the University of Pennsylvania

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