It was only eight years ago when the mayor of New York declared St Patrick’s Day “Gerry Adams Day” – it seems we forgot about that rather quickly.
Bill de Blasio presented Adams with a framed copy of the Proclamation of the Irish Republic; Leo Varadkar was in the audience, and not much was said about it afterwards (Varadkar was reportedly a little cross about the whole thing, but not enough to say so). The politics of Ireland used to be visible in New York – but on Monday we had proof they no longer do.
On the day before St Patrick’s Day, Zohran Mamdani – Democrat mayor of New York, a figurehead for the new generation of the American left – was asked if he supported a united Ireland. He laughed and equivocated: “I gotta be honest, I haven’t thought enough on that question.” Can you imagine the man who gifted Adams a copy of the Proclamation of the Irish Republic admitting to his voters that he hadn’t thought much about the question of unification? It would never wash.
The next day, with shamrocks on his lapel and Tricolour sash around his torso, Mamdani prevaricated again: “There’s always more to learn, but I can tell you as someone who believes deeply in the principle of self-determination, that I think that should also be extended to the Irish. I think when it comes to the future of Ireland, the best people to listen to are the Irish,” he said. Never had I thought a staunchly left mayor of New York would sound so much like a British diplomat.
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Somewhere in the foreign office in London they are scratching their heads: is Mamdani more on message than Joe Biden?
When Biden visited Ireland in 2023, he hobbled down kelly green carpets, backdropped by Tricolours and the Drop Kick Murphy’s. In 2020, when approached by a journalist who asked for “a quick word for the BBC?”, he responded: “The BBC? I’m Irish.”
He was on Ireland’s side in the denouement of Brexit: anything that would lead to a hardening of the Border would lead to hardening of the US-UK relationship, so the line went. He was fond of platitudinous Yeats-quoting too (“the centre has held” being a particularly low moment).
And that all rather sums it up, doesn’t it? Biden was the last man the Irish diaspora could exert influence on – an old, visibly decaying politician. But not only that, he was a symbol of a Democratic politics that does not exist any more: behind Israel without ever articulating why, deeply steeped in and aware of Irish national issues and demands, speaking primarily to an ethnically white voting bloc of which the Irish-Americans were a serious constituency.
[ From the Famine ship to the White House – Joe Biden’s Irish ancestryOpens in new window ]
Well, one thing is obvious: Mamdani has never had to listen to the Irish of New York banging on about the six counties, unlike Rudy Giuliani who used to speak of “occupation” during his time as mayor. Or de Blasio (why else would he have Adams around for breakfast?).
Mamdani represents a total departure from all that – the standard bearer of the new left where Palestine (or for him “anti-Zionism”) has eclipsed every other question as the primary motivating force. We can see the same contours emerging on the left in Britain with Corbyn’s new outfit, and the transformation of the Greens away from an environmentalist project into one terribly concerned with “post-colonialism”. The Irish left too has long been at the forefront of this transition.
But this is a story about two things: the changing nature of the left, yes, but also the diminishing power of Irish America.
Since the 1980s, fewer and fewer Americans identify as Irish. The issues of the diaspora are no longer important to the leading Democrat politician in the country. As a group, Irish Americans are more assimilated now (do we think Biden’s children are going around quoting Heaney and Yeats?).
In the US, St Patrick’s Day is a nostalgia drive, not an expression of anything particularly live. Northern Ireland is a long way from the average New Yorker’s imagination – in a way that was not true in the 70s and 80s. In fact, if you’re an Irish American living in New York you would be hard pressed to get regular news from Northern Ireland (how many of them are paying for a subscription to the Bel Tel?). There are powerful Irish in the United States – but the Collisons who set up Stripe, for example, hardly occupy the world of 1990s New York.
[ No wonder Tommy Robinson has become a Maga heroOpens in new window ]
Irish Americans now might be more likely to have the ear of Maga than the new Democrats.
It doesn’t matter what the mayor of New York thinks about the constitutional future of this island. But it does matter that he has no opinion at all. The only thing worse than being talked about ... and all that.
