In September of last year, President Biden surprised his own advisors and staffers by telling a media scrum that he planned on attending Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral. Plans were hastily made and the Bidens arrived a few days before the state funeral and they showed their respect officially. But don’t take that to mean that Dark Brandon is fond of the British monarchy. He is not. He just understood that QEII’s death represented the end of a significant era in British history and European politics. Despite the UK and America’s “special relationship,” President Biden has zero plans to attend the Chubbly aka the Clowning aka King Charles III’s coronation. Dark Brandon said: good luck, kiddo, but I ain’t going.

When King Charles III is formally crowned at Westminster Abbey on May 6, it is unlikely President Joe Biden will be in attendance, according to two people familiar with Biden’s plans.

“That does not feel like an event Joe Biden will attend,” says a White House official, who requested anonymity to discuss the President’s plans. The same official stressed that Biden’s schedule for May had not yet been finalized.

Foreign governments have recently been notified of the crown’s intent to invite foreign monarchs and other world leaders to attend Britain’s first coronation in 70 years, and formal invitations are set to be sent out in April, according to the Daily Mail. A spokesperson for the British Embassy in Washington wrote in an email to TIME that Buckingham Palace would release an update on who is confirmed to attend the coronation “in due course.”

Charles became King in September upon the death of his mother, Queen Elizabeth II. Biden and First Lady Jill Biden attended Queen Elizabeth’s funeral. Biden has often spoken of the tight bonds between the U.S. and Britain. And he was fond of Queen Elizabeth. After the two met in Windsor Castle in 2021, Biden said the Queen’s “look” and “generosity” reminded him of his own mother. ​​When Biden spoke with King Charles to offer his condolences after the death of Queen Elizabeth, Biden “conveyed his wish to continue a close relationship with the King,” according to a White House description of the conversation.

But Biden has long held a personal discomfort with the British monarchy. He is vocal and proud about his Irish heritage on his mother’s side, whose family he grew up with in Scranton, Pa., and who often expressed disdain for the monarchy that brutally colonized the island of Ireland for hundreds of years.

Shortly after election day in November 2020, a BBC reporter shouted out to Biden, “A quick word for the BBC?” Biden’s reply: “The BBC? I’m Irish.” Biden’s predecessor, Donald Trump, had a bust of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill in the Oval Office. When Biden moved in, he didn’t include Churchill in his redecoration of the iconic room.

[From Time]

Time Mag included some interesting history, which is that Dwight Eisenhower also skipped QEII’s coronation, but he made sure to send a delegation. Basically, the outlier here is Biden making a point to attend QEII’s funeral. The general rule is that American presidents don’t go out of their way to attend royal events in the UK, although (obviously) POTUSes do go out of their way to play host to various visiting royals. Like Biden doing a drive-by handshake for Prince William in Boston last December – that was easy to organize because Biden was already going to be in town. Biden’s not going to take his happy Irish ass to London just to watch Charles throw himself a big Chubbly party.

Also: in 2021, Charles and Camilla met President Biden at some environmental summit, and gossip reached the British media that Biden farted in front of Camilla and she indiscreetly told everyone she met about Biden’s gas. Maybe Charles and Camilla aren’t the diplomatic heavies they want people to believe, I’m just saying.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.