No, this 1973 photo doesn’t show Joe Biden using son Hunter for a photo opportunity

President Joe Biden changed his mind and on Dec. 1 pardoned his only surviving son, Hunter, who was facing federal gun and tax evasion charges. The move drew bipartisan criticism, and some social media users resurfaced an old photo of Joe Biden with his son.

A Dec. 2 Facebook post shared a 1973 photo of Joe Biden taking the oath of office for his first term as a Democratic U.S. senator for Delaware. In the photo’s bottom right corner, a young boy lies on a bed beside Biden.

Text above the photo read, "This is Joe Biden being sworn into the Senate. That little boy is Hunter. He has a fractured skull and brain injuries from the car wreck. Joe made him get dressed up for a photo op cause he thought it would be good for his career. Hate Joe. Pity Hunter. Kid never had a chance."

(Screenshot from Facebook)

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Although the post’s photo is authentic, the boy pictured is not Hunter Biden; it shows Beau Biden, Joe Biden’s first-born child. Beau died of brain cancer in 2015 at age 46.

About a month after Joe Biden was elected to the Senate in November 1972, his first wife, Neilia, and their 1-year-old daughter, Naomi, died in a car accident in northern Delaware. Their young sons, Beau, 4, and Hunter, 3, were seriously injured in the wreck.

In January 1973, Beau and Hunter were still recovering from their injuries at a Wilmington, Delaware, hospital when it was time for Joe Biden to be sworn in to the Senate. Joe Biden asked the Senate for permission to take his oath of office at the hospital, rather than the U.S. Capitol, so he could remain with his children.

Reporters and photographers documented the Jan. 5, 1975, ceremony. The Associated Press took the photo seen in the Facebook post, and the caption says the child pictured was Beau Biden, not Hunter. Getty Images also photographed the scene and identified the child as Beau.

In this Associated Press photo, taken the same day, both of Joe Biden’s sons are pictured.

We rate the claim that a photo shows Joe Biden using his son Hunter’s injuries from a car accident as a photo opportunity when taking the oath of office for Senate in 1973 False.

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