Senator Mark Kelly is six years older than his wife, former senator and gun safety advocate Gabrielle Giffords.

Kelly and Giffords met in China as part of a young leaders forum organised by the National Committee on US-China Relations and married in 2007.

Giffords was a rising star in the House of Representatives when she was shot in the head in 2011 while meeting with constituents outside a grocery store. She survived the shooting and has become a powerful advocate for safer gun laws.

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Kelly is a retired Nasa astronaut who has commanded several missions to the International Space Station, and he began his first term as a US senator for Arizona in 2021. He has remained a steady, loving presence as Giffords has slowly regained her abilities to read, speak and walk.

2. US Senator Bernie Sanders and Jane O’Meara Sanders

Senator Bernie Sanders is eight years older than his wife, Jane O’Meara Sanders.

Bernie met Jane at his first mayoral debate in 1981 while she was working as a community organiser. They dated for eight years before breaking up when Jane wanted to get married and Bernie didn’t. He came around a year later and proposed over ice cream sundaes at Friendly’s, and the couple wed in 1988.

3. US Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas and Virginia Thomas

Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas is eight years older than his wife, Virginia Thomas.

Clarence and Virginia Thomas met in 1986 at a conference in New York on affirmative action, and they married a year later.

Virginia’s conservative activism has proven controversial. She was present at the “Stop the Steal” rally at the Ellipse on January 6, 2021, but said she left before Trump took the stage, and she also denied having any ties to the event’s organisers. She also sent multiple text messages to chief of staff Mark Meadows encouraging him to help Trump overturn the election results, according to text messages Meadows provided to the January 6 committee investigating the Capitol riot.

Justice Thomas was the sole dissenter in the Supreme Court’s dismissal of Trump’s bid to prevent the January 6 committee from obtaining White House records.

4. President of the US Joe Biden and first lady Dr Jill Biden

President Joe Biden is nine years older than first lady Dr Jill Biden.

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“I was a senior, and I had been dating guys in jeans and clogs and T-shirts, he came to the door and he had a sport coat and loafers, and I thought, ‘God, this is never going to work, not in a million years,’” Jill told Vogue in 2016. “He was nine years older than I am! But we went out to see A Man and a Woman at the cinema in Philadelphia, and we really hit it off. When we came home, he shook my hand good night, I went upstairs and called my mother at 1:00am and said, ‘Mum, I finally met a gentleman.’”

Biden proposed five times before Jill said yes and they wed in 1977. After almost 45 years together, they still find small ways of surprising and showing their affection for each other.

5. US Senator Mitch McConnell and former transportation secretary Elaine Chao

There’s an 11-year age difference between Senator Mitch McConnell and former transportation secretary Elaine Chao.

McConnell and Chao met on a blind date set up by mutual friend Stuart Bloch and got married on Ronald Reagan’s birthday in 1993. In 2016, Chao told CBS News she calls McConnell her “low-maintenance husband”.

6. US Supreme Court justice Brett Kavanaugh and Ashley Estes Kavanaugh

Supreme Court justice Brett Kavanaugh is nine years older than his wife, Ashley Estes Kavanaugh.

The couple met while serving in the Bush administration in 2001. Kavanaugh served as former President George W. Bush’s staff secretary, and Estes Kavanaugh worked as the Bush’s personal secretary.

7. Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy and Carla Bruni-Sarkozy

Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy’s wife, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, is 13 years younger than him.

Bruni-Sarkozy, a former supermodel and singer-songwriter, met Sarkozy, then president of France, at a dinner party in 2007. The couple wed in 2008.

8. French president Emmanuel Macron and Brigitte Macron

Their relationship began when Brigitte was a married drama teacher at then-15-year-old Emmanuel’s high school. His parents sent him away to Paris when they learned of the romance, but the two remained close.

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They married in 2007 after Brigitte divorced her husband.

“Nobody would call it unusual if the age difference was reversed,” he told journalist Anne Fulda in her book Emmanuel Macron: A Perfect Young Man. “People find it difficult to accept something that is sincere and unique.”

9. Former US president Donald Trump and former first lady Melania Trump

The two went public nearly a year after they met at a party in a Times Square nightclub during fashion week in September 1998. They wed at a star-studded event in 2005 and remained notable figures in New York’s social scene until Trump was elected president in 2016. He served one term in office until Biden’s victory in 2020, after which he and Melania retired to his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida.

10. Former Brazilian president Michel Temer and Marcela Temer

Former Brazilian president Michel Temer is 42 years older than his wife, Marcela Temer.

Michel served as president of Brazil from 2016 to 2019 after his predecessor, Dilma Rousseff, was impeached. Marcela is a former beauty queen who met Temer when she was 19 and he was 60. They wed in 2003.