As Martin O'Malley continues his week-long celebration of St. Patrick's Day with a wee bit of guitar playing tonight in Washington, a well-known Irish-American Democrat from Boston says he told the former Maryland governor to give Hillary Clinton a competitive race.
Thomas P. O'Neill III, son of the late speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, said he ran into O'Malley Monday at a Washington dinner hosted by the American Ireland Funds, a philanthrophic group.
O'Malley approached O'Neill during a lull in the black-tie festivities — which featured Enda Kenny, Ireland's Taoiseach, or prime minister — and asked the Boston public relations executive and former Massachusetts lieutenant governor a simple question.
"He said, 'What do you think?'" O'Neill said. "I simply said [Clinton] deserves to have as much competition as someone can muster for her. She needs to have a contested race going into that nomination."
In other words, O'Malley should run for president, O'Neill said.
"He's a very good candidate. He's a great public servant. He deserves to be in the race," O'Neill said.
O'Malley, who says he is considering a presidential bid, has not been given much of a chance because Clinton has sucked up all of the attention.
"That doesn't mean this isn't going to be a competitive race," O'Neill said. "You can't judge it in March 2015."
After the two talked, O'Neill said the former two-term governor and two-term Baltimore mayor thanked him for his thoughts and said he'd be in touch.
O'Neill has not announced his support for any client yet. But he hosted a fundraiser at his Boston office in 2006 that raised $25,000 for O'Malley's race for governor. At the time, O'Neill said the event was not simply about O'Malley's Irish heritage. But, he added then in an interview with The Baltimore Sun, "Does the Irish thing matter? Of course it does."
He wasn't the only Irish-American excited about O'Malley's presidential prospects even back then. Much of that enthusiasm dates to a 2003 article in Irish America Magazine that said, "O'Malley is seen as a future Democratic presidential candidate."
In his 2006 campaign, O'Malley tapped into Irish-American support across the Northeast. In Washington, a group called Irish American Democrats raised $60,000 for O'Malley, whose great-grandfather emigrated from the Galway area of Ireland and settled in Pittsburgh. In New York, attorneys at the O'Dwyer & Bernstein firm started a group called New York Irish for Martin O'Malley.
Flash forward nine years and O'Malley is still dancing his Irish jig for all its worth.
On Saturday he marched in Chicago's St. Patrick's Day Parade while in town for private meetings. He posted a photo on Twitter of him and William Hite, the parade's grand marshal and president of Annapolis-based United Association union of plumbers. On Monday night he posted a Twitter photo from the Ireland Funds dinner. On St. Patrick's Day morning on Tuesday, O'Malley played his guitar at a private event at the James Joyce Irish Pub in Baltimore.
And tonight O'Malley is scheduled to perform with his Celtic rock band, O'Malley's March, in Washington at an event in honor of St. Patrick's Day. The concert is the latest in a series of "Young Leaders Council" events hosted by O'Malley's political action committee O' Say Can You See.
Sun reporter Erin Cox contributed to this report.