FBI Reveals Plot to Kill the Queen: Irish Republicans protest Elizabeth II's California tour (1983)

On 3 March 1983, Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh attended a state banquet held in their honour by US President Ronald Reagan and First Lady Nancy Reagan. The Queen and the Duke were on the 19th day of their Royal tour of America’s West Coast, which saw the monarch visit San Diego, Palm Springs, Los Angeles, Sierra Madre, Duarte, Santa Barbara, San Francisco, Sacramento, Stanford, Palo Alto, Yosemite, and Seattle! The tour was marked by bad weather, something which the Queen joked about in her speech at the De Young Museum in San Francisco. On 26 May 2023, a newly-opened FBI file relating to the Queen’s 1983 visit to California revealed a potential plot to assassinate her. The document states that a suspected IRA-sympathiser who claimed his daughter had been killed by a rubber bullet in Northern Ireland made a call in which he stated that he would “attempt to harm Queen Elizabeth” – either by “dropping some object off the Golden Gate Bridge" as the royal yacht Britannia sailed underneath or by attempting to assassinate the monarch during her visit to Yosemite national park. The revelation puts this ITN footage into a new context, the clip ending with footage of Irish republican protests against Britain’s actions in Northern Ireland taking place outside the De Young Museum while the banquet was taking place inside. #QueenElizabethII #TheQueen #QueenElizabeth #IRA #FBI #Assassination #Plot #Ireland #NorthernIreland #IrishRepublicans #RonaldReagan #NancyReagan #PrincePhilip #California #RoyalTour #RoyalFamily #RoyalHistory #Reagan #PresidentReagan #POTUS #FirstLady #FLOTUS To license the footage featured in this clip, follow the link below: https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/video/royal-tour-of-the-day-19-usa-california-san-francisco-news-footage/1374546199?adppopup=true To search the ITN Archive collection on Getty Images, follow the link below: https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/footage/itn 🎥 Subscribe to our YouTube channel (tap the bell icon and stay up to date with all the latest ITN Archive videos!) - https://www.youtube.com/@ITNArchive 🎥 Follow us on Twitter - https://twitter.com/ITNArchive 🎥 Like us on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/ITNArchiveITNP 🎥 Check out our TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@itnarchive1955