Proposed Biden visit to Cork referred to US

A PROPOSAL that US president Joe Biden would visit Cork has been referred to the White House by Tánaiste Micheál Martin’s office.

Mr Biden, who has always been fiercely proud of his Irish heritage, recently announced that he intends to visit Ireland, North and South, for the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement.

No date has yet been confirmed, but the anniversary of the signing of the Good Friday Agreement is on Monday, April 10, and there has been speculation that Mr Biden might visit in the week to 10 days after that.

The president is expected to visit Belfast and Dublin, calling to see Taoiseach Leo Varadkar at Government Buildings and President Michael D Higgins at Áras An Uachtaráin.

Further engagements have yet to be announced, but Mr Biden is thought likely to visit his ancestral homes in Mayo and Louth.

Mr Biden’s great-great-great-grandfather Edward Blewitt emigrated from Ballina in Co Mayo after the Great Famine, settling in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and his great-great-grandfather Owen Finnegan left the Cooley peninsula in Co Louth in the 1840s, heading to Seneca, New York.

It is not known whether Mr Biden has any Cork connections, but Labour local area representative for Cork City Peter Horgan thinks he has spotted an angle and has suggested that an invitation should be issued.

“I’ve contacted both the Tánaiste and the Lord Mayor in the hope that an invitation can issue to president Biden to visit Cork when he comes to Ireland,” Mr Horgan told The Echo.

“It’s 60 years since Cork last hosted a sitting US president. It would be fitting that the current US president, a member of the same party as JFK, and with such strong Irish roots, would visit Cork.”

On June 28, 1963, US president John Fitzgerald Kennedy, in Ireland for a four-day official visit, arrived by helicopter at Collins Barracks. He was then taken by motorcade down Summerhill, along MacCurtain Street, over Patrick’s Bridge, along Patrick’s Street, Grand Parade, and the South Mall and over Brian Boru Bridge to City Hall, where he was to be conferred with the Freedom of the City by Lord Mayor Sean Casey.

Almost six decades after the 35th US president’s visit to Leeside, Mr Horgan believes an invitation should be sent to the 46th.

“It would renew the binds that we have with the US for generations and be an opportunity to show Cork in its best light.”

Two years ago, when then-taoiseach Micheál Martin invited Mr Biden to Ireland, the president replied: “Just try stopping me.”

Now, Mr Martin’s office has responded to Mr Horgan’s suggestion. “As you will appreciate, the details of President Biden’s visit are yet to be confirmed,” wrote a spokesperson for Mr Martin. “However, we will share your proposal with our US counterparts for their consideration as part of their ongoing planning for the president’s visit.”

Commenting on the reply, Mr Horgan told The Echo: “It’s not a no.”