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VP Goes Full Biden for Senate Swearing-In Ceremony

Biden jokes with skeptical kids and calls a senator by her husband's name at ceremonial event.
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Vice President Biden did some, well, Bidening on Tuesday during the ceremonial swearings-in of new members of the United States Senate.

Biden’s banter at same event at the beginning of last Congress – which included instructing one participant to “spread your legs, you’re gonna be frisked!” – meant that an audience of political junkies tuned in to C-SPAN eager for a repeat performance.

They weren’t disappointed. The vice president hugged, joked, cajoled and selfie-d his way through the proceedings, embracing countless reluctant-looking children, taking three camera-phone selfies and telling nearly every male senator that he, like himself, had “married up.”

“I need a hug,” he told the daughter of Sen. Mark Warner, a Democrat from Virginia.

“I like kids better than adults,” he admitted to the family of new GOP Sen. Steve Daines of Montana.

“I may be Irish but I'm not stupid,” he instructed another youngster.

Biden, who has five grandchildren, also made this questionable observation about having granddaughters: “I don't know what your experience is, but one night when they're like 12 and a half, you tuck this beautiful butterfly in bed and then the next morning- there's a snake in the bed!"

But the most awkward moment of the lengthy swearings-in came when he greeted newly-elected Republican Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa.

“Gail!” the vice president exclaimed, prompting Ernst to correct him.

“It’s Joni,” she said. “My husband’s Gail.”

- Katie Wall and Carrie Dann