US President Joe Biden will return to County Mayo on Friday

US President Joe Biden will return to his roots in County Mayo on Friday on the final day of his visit to Ireland.

Mr Biden has links to the county through his great grandfather Edward Blewitt.

The president is due to speak at a homecoming celebration outside St Muredach's Cathedral in the town of Ballina on Friday night.

A crowd of up to 20,000 people are expected to line the streets of the town for the event.

It is thought that the president will be presented with a brick from a fireplace that is the last surviving piece of his ancestral home in the town.

St Muredach's Cathedral in Ballina is lit up ahead of Friday's festivities

The mayor of Ballina, Mark Duffy, said people were eagerly awaiting the president's arrival.

"This is a homecoming event, it's a welcome home where he has family and friends in the area," he told BBC News NI.

"I hope there is respect given to that because they are true ties, they are sincere links, it's not engineered, it's not fabricated.

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"It's meaningful for the president, it's meaningful for the people here in town."