WASHINGTON – President Joe Biden said Friday he will attend Queen Elizabeth II‘s funeral.
“I don’t know what the details are yet, but I’ll be going,” Biden told reporters traveling with him in Ohio.
The date and details of the queen’s funeral have not been set but will be released “in due course,” according to Buckingham Palace. The funeral is expected to take place within the next 10 days at Westminster Abbey in central London.
The queen will then be laid to rest in St. George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle alongside her mother, father and husband Prince Philip.
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Queen Elizabeth, Britain’s longest-serving monarch, died Thursday at Balmoral Castle, her summer residence in Scotland, after 70 years on the throne. She was 96. Her eldest son and heir, Prince Charles, Prince of Wales, immediately became King Charles III upon her death.
In a statement issued shortly after her death, Biden and first lady Jill Biden praised the queen for leading with “grace, an unwavering commitment to duty and the incomparable power of her example.”
“Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II was more than a monarch,” the Bidens said. “She defined an era.”
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Biden has known the queen for three decades and has met her three times, most recently in June 2021, when she hosted him and the first lady at Windsor Castle during their visit to the U.K. to attend the Group of Seven leaders’ summit.
After that visit, Biden told reporters the queen was “very gracious” and said he invited her to the White House. Biden said the monarch reminded him of his late mother.
Queen Elizabeth met every U.S. president since Harry Truman, with the exception of Lyndon B. Johnson. She met former Herbert Hoover, though it was decades after he left office.
Biden has ordered flags over the White House and other public buildings be flown at half-staff until sunset on the day of the queen’s burial.
Michael Collins covers the White House. Follow him on Twitter @mcollinsNEWS.
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