ced it would begin, had the blessing of the US Soccer Football Association (now US Soccer). “The offensive coordinator [Josh Blankenship], he told me he wanted me to come out for a visit. He plunged ahead, accepting Obama’s invitation to be the US ambassador to Ireland, a post he held between 2009 and 2012. s in the rear of the building when he became engaged in a verbal altercation with a 25-year-old male, whose name is also being withheld.