President Biden claimed in a lengthy anecdote Monday that his great-grandfather was rumored to have been part of a group of coal miners who killed anti-Catholic mine foremen and left the bodies “on the doorstep” of his family’s homes.
Vice President Kamala Harris nodded in agreement as the 81-year-old president told the bizarre story while addressing union workers in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She joked that she was “disappointed” to learn that her great-grandfather Edward Francis Blewitt was not a member of the “Molly Maguires.”
“I remember when my great-grandfather was the second Catholic to be elected to the state Senate in Pennsylvania,” Biden said. “And I remember when he ran against him in 1906, they said, 'Guess what? He's a Molly Maguire.'”
The President explained that “in the old days” Irish Catholics working in Pennsylvania coal mines were often mistreated by foremen, and that a group of recently arrived Irishmen, known as the Molly Maguires, retaliated violently against their oppressors.
“A lot of the British owned coal mines,” Biden said. “And what they did was they beat up most of the Catholic population in the mines. That's no joke.”
“But there was a group they called the Molly Magyars,” he added. “And the Molly Magyars, if they found out that the foreman was taking advantage of a person, they would literally kill him. This is no joke. And they would bring his body up and put it on his family's doorstep.”
“It's very corny, but I have to admit that they accused my great-grandfather of being Molly Maguire – he wasn't Molly Maguire, but we were very disappointed.”
AFL-CIO President Liz Schuler's head tilted back after Biden's quip. Harris, who was on stage with the president, also laughed.
“It was a joke. It was a joke,” Biden assured the crowd.
A story from 2020 Irish American Magazine This appears to corroborate Biden's claim that his great-grandfather was also allegedly part of this secret group.
The publication also noted that Biden told a similar anecdote about Blewitt to former President Barack Obama during the 2008 election campaign, but with a different punchline.
“He did everything he could to prove he wasn't (Molly Maguire), and we were all praying he was,” Biden said to a crowd of Virginia coal miners.
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