CBS News: Biden to attend Pope Francis' funeral

[Dennis Donovan]

CBS News - Biden to attend Pope Francis' funeral

By Ed O'Keefe, Fin Daniel Gómez
Updated on: April 25, 2025 / 9:45 AM EDT / CBS News

Former President Joe Biden, who maintained a close working and personal relationship with Pope Francis dating back to the late pontiff's visit to the United States in 2015, will attend the papal funeral Saturday in Vatican City, Biden's office confirmed Friday.

Former first lady Jill Biden will also be traveling with her husband to Italy for the funeral.

Francis began his papacy in 2013 during the Obama administration, but former President Barack Obama is not planning to attend, according to a spokesman.



President Trump and first lady Melania Trump are set to fly Friday morning to Rome for the Saturday funeral.

/snip

[Kingofalldems]

1. I understand he will sit back in the 3rd row.

[onenote]

15. Unclear. Very likely he'll be further back

Seating arrangements discussed here:
https://www.reuters.com/world/seating-plan-popes-funeral-its-complicated-or-compliqu-2025-04-25/

[JustAnotherGen]

2. Good

He's an actual Catholic and walks the talk.

[Irish_Dem]

3. Joe stay the H away from the orange F-wad.

[Johonny]

4. Please, dont sit him next to Vance

[greatauntoftriplets]

5. Good.

The Pope actually liked Biden. This could make for some interesting moments, though.

[bif]

6. Is he going to carpool with the Rapist?

[Ilsa]

13. The decent thing to do would be for Krasnov to

invite the Bidens to fly on AF1. But maybe Krasnov is afraid Joe would say no and the press would find out.

[Danmel]

7. I was really hoping he would attend.

A much better representative of our country.

[JohnSJ]

8. I had no doubt about that.

[bmichaelh]

9. Seating arrangement explained

Last edited Fri Apr 25, 2025, 12:35 PM - Edit history (1)

Here is an article on the seating arrangement.

https://www.reuters.com/world/seating-plan-popes-funeral-its-complicated-or-compliqu-2025-04-25/

In seating, royalty precedes elected heads of state.
There will not be a precedence of Catholic royalty over non-Catholic royalty.

Elected heads of state is done in alphabetical order by French equivalent name; for example, French word for United States is Etats-unis, French word for Germany is Allemagne, French word for Ukraine is Ukraine, etc.

So Trump will not sit next to Zelensky.

[BidenRocks]

10. Put Biden in the front row

Chump in the latrine!

[kkmarie]

11. Of course if it rains

Krasnov will not attend

[CBHagman]

12. So appropriate. So poignant.

President Biden was to see the pope back before his term in office ended but had to cancel because of urgent concerns (I cannot remember now whether they concerned Gaza, Ukraine, or another emergency). I wonder if both of them knew that they would never meet again in this world.

It's only right that the second Catholic president be there when the world gathers for the Mass.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

14. This made me smile

[onenote]

16. Is there a source for this.Appears to be untrue.

https://www.reuters.com/world/seating-plan-popes-funeral-its-complicated-or-compliqu-2025-04-25/