The man who is third in line to be president has appeared in five different Batman movies

Patrick Leahy might not be a name that everyone is aware of but if you’ve seen the 2008 Oscar-winning movie The Dark Knight you will definitely know who he is.

In his day job Leahy is a US Senator from Vermont and was recently appointed by Joe Biden as the new president pro tempore of the Senate, replacing the Republican Chuck Grassley in the role. 

Thanks to this Leahy is now third in line to the presidency behind vice president Kamala Harris and speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. ‘That’s all well and good, but what does this have to do with The Dark Knight?' you might say.

Well, 80-year-old is an avid comic book reader and is a huge fan of Batman. He has even written essay and forwards about the Caped Crusader for books published DC Comics. His fandom hasn’t ceased there though. It has even gone as far as appearing in five different Batman movies. 

Leahy has had cameos dating back to 1995 when he had an uncredited role in Batman Forever. Since then he has appeared in Batman and Robin (1997), The Dark Knight (2008), The Dark Knight Rises (2012) and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016).

You will probably best remember him in The Dark Knight when he confronts Heath Ledger’s Joker, who tells the senator that he reminds him of his father.

Leahy even had a role in the iconic and critically acclaimed Batman: The Animated Series when he played a territorial governor in the episode Showdown from 1995.

The Hill reported in 2012 that despite making all of these appearances Leahy has always dedicated his paycheck and any subsequent royalties to the children’s wing of the Kellogg-Hubbard Library in Montpellier, Vermont, the very place where he used to read Batman comics as a child. 

As for his actual job, this won’t be the first time that he’s held the position of Senate president. He held it between 2012 and 2015 but joked that he might not be too happy to get the position back. After being congratulated on the role, Leahy reportedly said in an interview, “Do you mean congratulations or condolences?”

Regardless how he feels about the job there is definitely not going to be any politician in the world who has rubbed shoulders with the likes of Christian Bale, George Clooney and Ben Affleck in Gotham City, is there?

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