Member's statement: US Election/Armistice Day/A&E Sexual Assaults

Member's statement by Mr Jonathan Buckley on 12 November 2024.

MLA: Mr Jonathan Buckley
Party at the time: Democratic Unionist Party
Date: 12 November 2024
Type: Member's statement
Business: Members' Statements
Heading: US Election/Armistice Day/A&E Sexual Assaults
Assembly identifier: Official Report component 4658201

Text

I associate myself with the congratulatory remarks to President Trump on securing a historic second term in office. Although I was convinced that President Trump would win the election, the scale by which he did so came as a shock. It was a decisive victory at the electoral college: some 312 votes, compared with Kamala Harris's 226. That represents a historic victory, in spite of a liberal media elite that attempted to deride his campaign and a worryingly corrupt legal system that attempted to have him removed from the campaign.
It is also a victory for everyday Americans, some 75 million of them, who chose not to be blindly led by celebrity endorsements but followed the convictions of their heart to elect President Trump for a historic second term. History will record that, in his first term of office, President Trump showed a warm affection for the United Kingdom in spite of some very derogatory terms that were put his way by some senior politicians in the United Kingdom, so it is my hope that President Trump will continue in the vein of having a strong, warm relationship with the UK in his second term of office. May I be the first in the Chamber to extend an open invitation to President Trump to come to Northern Ireland? Northern Ireland has a great history of interaction with US presidents, with no fewer than 20 of Ulster-Scots descent coming from this place. Whether they were Democratic Party presidents or Republican Party presidents, Northern Ireland had a special place in their heart, and I hope that this second term can continue in that vein. Mr Speaker, I congratulate you on a fitting and dignified Armistice Day service yesterday in the Senate Chamber. For all Members to pause and to reflect on those who paid the supreme sacrifice is hugely befitting of this place. I congratulate you for that. Also, I want to raise a worrying statistic that was revealed to me just yesterday, via a question for written answer to the Health Minister. In the past five years, 2,341 sexual assaults have happened in accident and emergency units and on the hospital estate across Northern Ireland. That is hugely concerning to us all. In the past five years, there have been 37 sexual assaults in the Western Trust and 1,482 in the Belfast Trust. The number has trebled. In the Northern Trust, there have been 255. In the Southern Trust, there were 333, and, in the South Eastern Trust, there were 234. There is huge concern —
— and I hope that, in the near future, the Minister will explain the reasons for that trend.

443 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers met the documented threshold for “not flagged”.

Overall probability that the activity is being used to promote, exploit or escalate an identity-based controversy: 0.14 (flagging needs at least 0.70; at or below 0.30 is not flagged).
None of the five culture-war criteria was met (each was below 0.60).
No identity-based framing was identified (0.82).
Subject area: Irish language, Ulster-Scots and language policy.
The overall probability was at or below the not-flagging threshold.

This is an AI-generated assessment of the text, made against published criteria. It is not a finding of fact about the MLA or their intentions. The Assembly record itself is the fact.

Jev’s structured answers

Probability that each statement is true of this text (0 = no, 1 = yes). A criterion counts as met at 0.60 or above.
Question	Probability	Met?
Identity framing	0.18	No
Sectarian or communal antagonism	0.13	No
Cultural grievance politics	0.03	No
Dog-whistle messaging	0.27	No
Controversy escalation	0.21	No
Legitimate policy scrutiny	0.46	No
Overall judgement	0.14	At or below not-flagging threshold

Context and attribution (stance)
Option	Probability
No identity-based framing (chosen)	0.82
Reports or questions it	0.01
Criticises or condemns it	0.00
Adopts it	0.17

Subject area (top five)
Subject	Probability
Irish language, Ulster-Scots and language policy	0.44
No identity-related subject	0.18
Gender, sexuality, abortion and related social issues	0.15
Sexism, misogyny, ageism and other equality groups	0.08
Another identity-related subject	0.08

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 11:32 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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