Timothy Meagher , associate professor of history, was quoted in a New York Times story on Irish-Americans, politics, and immigration. See below.
From: NY Times Date: March 16, 2017Author: Liam Stack
... Irish-Americans were staunch Democrats for much of the 20th century, backing the New Deal, venerating the Kennedys and supporting President Bill Clinton's efforts to negotiate peace in Northern Ireland, said Timothy J. Meagher, a historian at the Catholic University of America. Now Irish-Americans are much more mixed.
Dr. Meagher said Irish-Americans' shift to the right was driven by reasons both complex and common: Many Catholics opposed abortion and gay marriage; some upwardly mobile Irish-Americans wanted lower taxes; those who were struggling financially were often part of a broader white working-class estrangement from the Democratic Party, in which anxieties about race and immigration played a role.
"In terms of who would invoke their own past to explain their beliefs, you might get that on either side" of the political divide, Dr. Meagher said. "You see people who might say, 'My people came here legally,' even though there weren't real restrictions on white immigrants coming to the United States until 1924." ...