President Joe Biden said Thursday he plans to attend the funeral for Queen Elizabeth II, a monarch he is remembering as a “great lady.”
“Yes,” Biden told reporters Friday when asked whether he planned to attend the funeral, details of which have not been announced by Buckingham Palace.
“I don’t know what the details are yet but I will be going,” Biden said in Ohio, where he was traveling for the groundbreaking of a computer chip factory.
Earlier Friday, Britain’s new King Charles III said during a televised address that services for his late mother would occur later this month.
“In a little over a week’s time we will come together as a nation, as a Commonwealth and indeed a global community, to lay my beloved mother to rest,” Charles said in the speech, his first as king.
Biden told reporters in Ohio he’d not yet spoken to Charles following the Queen’s death.
“I know him. I haven’t spoken to him. I did not call him yet,” Biden said.
On Friday, White House aides had begun making initial preparations for Biden to travel to London to attend the Queen’s funeral. They had only planned to announce his attendance after the palace reveals the arrangements, according to people familiar with the matter.
