Joe Biden decided to conclude his four-day official visit to Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland with a final tribute to his ancestors in Ballina, in the northwest of the island. The US president said goodbye in the smell of crowds, entertained by a long line of more than 20,000 followers on a trip with a marked political and emotional tinge.
“Can you deny that you are anti-British, Mr. Biden?” Was the headline with which The Daily Mail sent him, along with a selfie of the president with the former leader of Sinn Féin, Gerry Adams, and echoing the darts thrown at him by Union politicians during his visit to Belfast.
The British conservative press has also highlighted the rudeness made to King Carlos III at the beginning of the trip to the two Irelands, informing him that he will not attend the Coronation, and the cafe where the bilateral meeting with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who decided to be absent, was held. of his speech at Ulster University.
The local media highlighted, however, the visit of the second Catholic president of the US as a reminder of the “American dream”, although there was also criticism for the nostalgic and religious version of Biden, anchored in the distant past and little in tune with the new social and economic reality of the Republic of Ireland.
“The feet will end up taking you where the heart is,” Biden proclaimed in his speech before Parliament and the Senate in Dublin this Thursday, following in the footsteps of John F. Kennedy, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton (who will arrive next Monday accompanied by Hillary and by Senator George Mitchell in a new American landing for the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement).
In all his interventions, including the last one in the Ballina cathedral – built with more than 20,000 bricks that his great-grandfather sold to be able to emigrate to the United States – Biden emphasized the “peace and prosperity” binomial and stressed that there will be no return to political violence on the island.
On his way through Belfast, he made a veiled appeal to the unionists to put an end to the blockade of the unity government and accept the Windsor Agreement sealed with Brussels by the British Government. The US president has promised to triple US investment if political stability in Ulster is guaranteed.
After his visit to County Louth on Wednesday, to meet the Finnegan clan, Biden wanted to dedicate his last day to the other branch of the maternal family tree: the Blewitts. Legend has it, and reaffirms the story, that his great-grandfather sold 20,000 bricks to Ballina Cathedral to finance his trip to the New World and escape the famine that struck Ireland in the mid-19th century.
Accompanied by his son Hunter and his sister Valerie, the Democratic president celebrated his emotional meeting with the priest and former US Army chaplain, Frank O’Grady, who gave extreme unction to his son Beau, who died in 2015 of cancer cerebral.
As fate would have it, O’Grady was destined for a sanctuary in County Mayo. Biden found out on the fly and entrusted a Secret Service agent with the task of finding him in time. The president could not contain his tears and remembered his son with the priest with a prayer.
According to the criteria of The Trust Project