Irish PM ‘sorry’ for Clinton intern joke
LEO VARADKAR, Ireland’s prime minister, has apologised for making an “illjudged” joke about Bill Clinton’s interns while on a trip to the US.
Mr Varadkar told an event he was an intern in the last year of Mr Clinton’s presidency at a time “when some parents would have had cause for concern about what would happen to interns in Washington”.
The unscripted gaffe, a reference to the former US president’s affair with Monica Lewinsky, an intern, came on the eve of St Patrick’s Day, when many Irish and Northern Irish politicians travel to the US. Mr Varadkar, who worked as an intern for a Republican congressman when he was 21, had earlier spoken at an event celebrating
“Women at the Helm” in politics. Hillary Clinton, the former first lady, was among those attending the event at Georgetown University in Washington.
“The Taoiseach was reminiscing about his time in Washington DC as an intern 23 years ago,” Mr Varadkar’s spokesman said. “He made an ill-judged off-the-cuff remark which he regrets.
He apologises for any offence caused.” Mrs Clinton also risked controversy at a separate event by suggesting that DUP politicians should resign if they were not willing to end their boycott of the Northern Ireland Assembly.
The DUP refused to return to powersharing with Sinn Fein over the Northern Ireland Protocol.