During a Harris-Walz campaign event in Pennsylvania, President Biden surprised union workers by sharing an unusual anecdote about his great-grandfather allegedly being connected to the notorious Irish secret society known as the Molly Maguires.
This revelation was made during his Labor Day speech at a union hall in Pittsburgh, reported by Fox News, and caught many attendees off guard.
Biden recounted, “I remember when my great-grandfather was only the second Catholic elected statewide in the state Senate here in Pennsylvania. And I remember they talked about—when they’d run against him in 1906—they said, ‘Guess what? He’s a Molly Maguire.’”
The Molly Maguires, a notorious clandestine organization of Irish origin, operated in Pennsylvania and gained notoriety for reportedly assaulting and even killing mine owners who opposed Irish Catholics.
Biden further detailed the difficult circumstances endured by Catholic immigrants working in coal mines, which were predominantly owned by Protestant English individuals.
“A lot of the English owned the coal mines,” he said. “And what they did was they really beat the hell out of the mostly Catholic population in the mines. Not a joke.”
The President went on to describe how the Molly Maguires would defend these Catholic workers, often resorting to extreme measures.
“If they found out the foreman was taking advantage of an individual, they would literally kill him. Not a joke. And they would bring his body up and put him on the doorstep of his family,” Biden explained.
He then quipped that his family had been disappointed when they discovered his great-grandfather wasn’t actually part of the group. “Kind of crude, but I gotta admit they accused my great-grandfather of being a Molly Maguire—he wasn’t, but we were so damn disappointed,” he joked.
The internet was swiftly inundated with responses to Biden’s narrative, with numerous individuals deeming it an “incredibly strange” anecdote.
Some online commentators implied that the story was a fabrication, casting doubt on the plausibility of Biden’s great-grandfather being associated with the Molly Maguires, given that he would have been an adolescent during their heyday in Pennsylvania.
https://twitter.com/TrumpWarRoom/status/1830731024659284019?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
https://twitter.com/greg_price11/status/1830733463160529315?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
https://twitter.com/shipwreckedcrew/status/1830738297653797332?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Fox News Digital contacted the White House for clarification, but they referred to an article from Irish America Magazine that detailed the history of Biden’s great-grandfather.
The 2020 article mentioned that Edward Francis Blewitt had strong connections to Scranton, Pennsylvania, a known location for the Molly Maguires, but did not confirm direct involvement with the group.
Biden’s great-grandfather, who chaired the Saint Patrick’s Day Parade in 1897 and was elected to the state senate in 1906, was rumored to have ties to the Molly Maguires through his father.
Despite Biden’s vivid storytelling, the story remains a mix of family legend and historical enigma.
This recent anecdote adds to Biden’s tradition of referencing his family’s Irish heritage on the campaign trail, as he did during the 2008 election when he described himself as a “hard-coal miner” from Scranton.
Now, as Biden supports Kamala Harris, his captivating stories continue to attract attention—though not always of the kind he intends.
