New Zealand PM Jacinda Ardern to marry long-time partner

TIL Desk/World/Wellington/ New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and her long-term partner Clarke Gayford have become engaged to be married, her office said Friday. A spokesman for Ardern and Gayford said the couple, who have a baby daughter Neve, agreed to tie the knot over the Easter break.

He could not reveal whether a date for the prime ministerial nuptials had been set or who had proposed to whom. “I can’t say anything about it other than they are engaged and it happened over Easter,” the spokesman told.

Ardern, 38, had Neve last June, becoming only the second prime minister in the world to give birth while in office and later taking the infant onto the floor of the UN Assembly in New York.

Since the birth, Gayford, a television fishing show host, has taken on the role of stay-at-home dad. The engagement comes after a trying time for Ardern, who has been widely praised for her response to the March 15 Christchurch mosque shootings that claimed the lives of 51 Muslim worshippers.