Alice Muglia and William Russo had been running in the same political circles since 2012, when she was working for the re-election of President Barack Obama and he was working in the White House for Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., who is now the presumptive Democratic nominee.
“We were always a part of the crowd,” Ms. Muglia said with a sigh, “but it was never just us.”
These days, Ms. Muglia and Mr. Russo, both 33, are working for the presidential campaign of Mr. Biden — formally known as “Biden for President” — she in delegates operations and he as a deputy communications director.
They met on the floor of the McCormick Center in Chicago on election night in 2012. Since that time, Mr. Russo noted, “we each developed an overlapping group of friends and became friendly, but not close, in the intervening years.”
Once the Obama presidency ended in January 2017, effectively ending Ms. Muglia’s job as a protocol officer at the Defense Department, as well as Mr. Russo’s job as the adviser to the deputy secretary of the State Department, they began seeing more of each other. They went to ballgames with friends. Both traveled to Minneapolis for a mutual friend’s wedding and took weekend trips with friends.
During that time, Ms. Muglia, who graduated cum laude from Colgate, and Mr. Russo, who graduated from the University of Delaware and received a master’s degree in environment, development and policy from the University of Sussex in Brighton, England, began learning more about each other.
“Bill is so incredibly smart and he loves his family so much, and as somebody who really loves their family as well, it was just an incredible fit for me,” Ms. Muglia said. “He’s also really a lot of fun to be around.”
Mr. Russo said that he “greatly admired the depths of passion that Alice has for so many things, including her family.”
“She is an incredible cook and an incredible baker,” he added. “Getting to observe her more and watch the energetic way she puts herself into projects, both big and small, is incredibly impressive, and very attractive to me.”
In July 2018, after a mutual friend’s birthday party at a bar in Washington, they finally turned a romantic corner.
At the end of a celebratory night, they walked back down 14th Street toward their respective homes. Once they parted ways, and Ms. Muglia was back in her apartment, she sent Mr. Russo a text: “You should ask me out sometime, just us.”
Six days later, on July 26 2018, they were on a first date, just the two of them, at a French bistro in Washington.
They were married July 26 at the bride’s family’s summer home in Chilmark, Mass. Samuel L. Muglia, the bride’s brother, received temporary permission from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to officiate.
Before the coronavirus outbreak, the couple had intended to marry on Aug. 22 before more than 200 guests at the same family home in Chilmark.
Not only did their wedding date change, but the number of attendees tumbled to seven, including the couple’s parents, Elizabeth M. Russo of Exton, Pa., and Ellen F. Muglia and Richard L. Muglia of Greenwich, Conn.
The couple said that Mr. Russo’s father, the late William J. Russo, was surely there in spirit.
“We’re just doing family,” Ms. Muglia said.
