Broadcaster Mary Murphy will moderate presidential forum

Mary Murphy


 

By Irish Echo Staff

Mary Murphy, the 29-time Emmy Award winning news broadcaster, has been named the moderator for the bipartisan Irish American Presidential Forum which is set for New York City in April.

Murphy has long been a prominent Irish American journalist and has been familiar face and voice on television, most especially the WPIX channel.

The forum is scheduled to take place at Fordham Law School in Manhattan on Sunday, April 26, two days before primaries in New York, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Delaware and Maryland.

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Said a release from organizers: “There are some of the 43 million Americans of Irish descent, many want to know where the U.S. Presidential candidate stand on relevant foreign policy issues when casting their ballots. The Forum takes place just two days prior to the New York Primary vote.

“All of the major U.S. Presidential candidates, Democratic and Republican alike, have been invited to the forum to address major issues including America’s role in the Irish peace process, immigration policies between the U.S. and Ireland, the aftermath of Brexit and its impact on U.S. trade deals, and the position of the U.S. Special Peace Envoys to Northern Ireland.”

Continued the release: “Since the British government’s partition of Ireland, forcing it to become two separate nations in 1920, Irish America has ardently supported Ireland’s reunification, governed by the people without foreign interference. America’s continuing role supporting a fair and lasting peace in Ireland remains invaluable.”

Of moderator Murphy the release stated: “Ms. Murphy has spent her entire broadcasting career in in New York City television news and is the recipient of 29 Emmy awards (27 at WPIX), along with an Edward R. Murrow Award for writing and many first-place prizes from the Associated Press.

During her time at WPIX, Mary has anchored coverage of the 9/11 terror attacks, traveled town to town during Superstorm Sandy and did live coverage from Vatican City when Pope Francis was elected in 2013.

“She is the daughter of Irish immigrants who met in Rockaway Beach and initially settled in Woodside. Ms. Murphy’s late father was a New York City bus driver. She graduated from Queens College Magna Cum Laude and was selected for an internship with WCBS-TV in the 1980s, which was her entry into journalism, working her way up from production assistant to reporter and anchor.

“In December 2017, Ms. Murphy revealed a faulty pipe bomb was used by an accused terrorist beneath the Port Authority Bus Terminal and was first to report the 2017 Halloween truck attack on bicyclists in lower Manhattan an act of terror.

“She has been lead-reporter on some of New York’s most important news happenings, the assassination of NYPD Officer Edward Byrne, the John Gotti and Joel Steinberg trials, and crash of TWA Flight 800.

“In 2006, shortly before the fifth anniversary of 9/11, Mary visited a field in County Cork, Ireland, where a New York-based nurse had planted 343 trees in honor of the FDNY firefighters who died responding to the attacks to share that story with American audiences.

“Her 1994 interviews of the real people behind the Oscar-winning film ‘Schindler’s List’ was honored by the American Women in Radio and Television.”

Past candidates participating in presidential forums dating back to 1984 include President Bill Clinton, Senator John McCain, Vice President Al Gore, Governor Jerry Brown, Vice President Walter Mondale, Governor Michael Dukakis, and Reverend Jesse Jackson.

More information on the Irish American Presidential Forum from irish2020@gmail.com.

 

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