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Around 1,500 guests attended the largest Episcopal church in the US on Saturday, for the funeral of Barbara Bush. The wife of the 41st president, George HW Bush, and mother of the 43rd, George W Bush, died on Tuesday at her Houston home. She was 92.
First lady Melania Trump, former president Bill Clinton, former secretary of state and 2016 presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and former president Barack Obama and his wife Michelle Obama were among mourners at St Martin’s Episcopal Church in Houston.
The Obamas greet Melania Trump.
Donald Trump, a fierce critic and political rival of the Bush family, did not attend. The White House said this week Trump would stay away in order “to avoid disruptions due to added security, and out of respect for the Bush family and friends”.
On Wednesday, Trump said Barbara Bush was a “wonderful, wonderful person” and “a titan in American life”, adding: “Her strength and toughness really embodied the spirit of our country. She was a woman of proud patriotism and profound faith.”
On Saturday, the New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman, whom Trump spent some of the morning attacking, tweeted that “having [the president] there was not something the Bushes wanted”.
Trump later tweeted: “Today, my thoughts and prayers are with the entire Bush family. In memory of First Lady Barbara Bush, there is a remembrance display located at her portrait in the Center Hall of the White House.”
The president, who had gone to one of his golf courses in Florida, sent out the tweet in the same minute as a message with video of supporters apparently shot from the presidential motorcade, in which he praised “fantastic crowd and great people yesterday in Key West”.
Referring to Mar-a-Lago, his luxury resort, Trump then added that he was “heading to the Southern White House to watch the Funeral Service of Barbara Bush. First Lady Melania has arrived in Houston to pay our respects. Will be a beautiful day!”
Former presidents George W Bush and George HW Bush arrive, passing former first lady Hillary Clinton, former president Bill Clinton, former first lady Michelle Obama, former president Barack Obama and first lady Melania Trump.
In a statement on Friday, the Bush family said Barbara Bush had chosen her son Jeb, the former Florida governor who ran against Trump for the Republican nomination – and was notoriously derided by the billionaire as “low-energy” – to deliver a eulogy.
During the 2016 campaign, Trump also attacked Jeb’s brother, George W Bush, for his record in office, over the attacks of 9/11 and regarding the Iraq war. In return, George HW Bush has publicly called Trump a “blowhard”. George W Bush has settled for veiled criticism in public remarks.
Jeb Bush speaks during a funeral service for his mother, former first lady Barbara Bush.
In a short and emotional eulogy, Jeb Bush joked how his mother called her style of parenting “a benevolent dictatorship”, and added: “But honestly it wasn’t always benevolent.” He emphasised that one of the most important lessons his mother taught him and others was the power of laughter and that joy should be shared.
Bush choked up, saying his mother was “beautiful” until the very end. He felt priviliged, he said, to have had a “front row” seat to his parents’ romance.
Barbara Bush's casket is carried into St Martin's Episcopal Church by pallbearers at her funeral in Houston, Texas
Other eulogies were delivered by Barbara Bush’s long-time friend Susan Baker, wife of former secretary of state James Baker, and historian Jon Meacham, who wrote a biography of George HW Bush.
Meacham discussed the Bushes’ experiences during the second world war and said Barbara Bush was the “first lady of the greatest generation”. He also recalled her work bringing awareness to Aids patients and in promoting literacy and spoke of her quick wit. Barbara Bush was devoted to her husband of 73 years, he said, saying he was the “only boy she ever kissed”.
George HW Bush looks at the casket with his daughter Dorothy “Doro” Bush Koch.
Burial was set for the Bush Library at Texas A&M University, about 100 miles north-west of the city. The burial site is in a gated plot surrounded by trees and near a creek. Barbara Bush’s daughter, Robin, is buried there. She died of leukaemia in 1953, aged three.
Only one other woman has been married to one president and the mother of another. That was Abigail Adams, wife of the second president, John Adams, and mother of the sixth, John Quincy Adams.
(AFP)
