The state funeral of the 39th President of the USA, Jimmy Carter, took place today in Washington’s National Cathedral. In a speech, outgoing President Joe Biden described the former president as a person of character, kind and humble, with whom he had a friendship. The funeral ceremony was attended by all living American ex-presidents – Bill Clinton, George Bush Jr., Barack Obama and Donald Trump, who will return to the White House on January 20 after a four-year hiatus.
Photo: TASR/AP, Haiyun Jiang
U.S. President Joe Biden touches the casket containing the remains of the late former U.S. President Jimmy Carter during a state funeral at the National Cathedral in Washington, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025.
Carter was the 39th President of the United States and served from 1977–1981. He died on December 29, 2024 at the age of 100, making him the oldest US president.
In his speech at the ceremony, Biden repeatedly described Carter as a person of character who was kind, humble and religious. At the same time, he described the mutual friendship that had united them since Biden supported Carter’s candidacy as a young senator. “My friendship with Jimmy Carter has taught me throughout my life that strength of character is more than a title or the power we hold,” Biden said.
Several of Carter’s grandsons spoke at the funeral, from whom it was heard that Carter cared about the poor, wanted to fight diseases in distant countries and sought world peace. Faith also played an important role in his life.
Also speaking was the son of Carter’s predecessor in the White House, Gerald Ford, Steven Ford, who read the speech of his father, the 38th president of the United States. Carter, a Democrat, and Ford, a Republican, who died aged 93 in 2006, agreed during their lifetimes to write each other’s eulogies, having become friends over the years. “For Jimmy Carter, honesty was not an aspirational goal, it was part of his soul,” Ford said.
Carter’s Vice President Walter Mondale’s son, Ted Mondale, also spoke, reading what his father, who died in 2021, had written about his superior. “Carter was prescient; he put aside his short-term political interests to address issues that demanded sacrifice and to protect our children and grandchildren from future harm,” he said.
Several songs were played during the funeral, and at the end the peace song Imagine by John Lennon.
Trump’s former vice president Mike Pence, among others, arrived at the funeral. Trump met him in person today for the first time since the violence in the Capitol on January 6, 2021, when Trump’s supporters tried to prevent the confirmation of Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential election. Trump then unsuccessfully urged Pence to refuse to confirm the election result as the head of the Senate. Today’s funeral was also attended by Vice President Kamala Harris. Trump sat next to Obama, with whom he spoke at length before the ceremony began. Harris, whom Trump defeated in the November election, did not speak to Trump. With the exception of Obama, ex-presidents were accompanied by their wives. According to CNN, Michelle Obama did not arrive because she is in Hawaii, where she had another program.
Among the important guests at Carter’s funeral were, for example, UN Secretary General António Guterres and outgoing Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
Carter’s body will be flown to his native Georgia later today for a private funeral. The former president will be buried next to his wife Rosalynn Carter, whom he married in 1946 and who died in November 2023. The Carters had the longest-lasting marriage of any US president.
Source: spravy.pravda.sk
