President Donald Trump said Saturday that he would “love” to see a unified Ireland, setting off strong reactions in the United Kingdom and beyond.
“Well, I don’t want to cause any problems, but I will tell you I’d love to see it unified,” the president told reporters at a meeting with Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin in Dublin, where residents took to the streets to protest Trump’s visit.
“Now, the U.K. will have something to say about it, obviously,” Trump acknowledged. “But I think it would be a great thing. I mean, how can it be bad?” He added: “I think it would be a fantastic thing.”
The president’s comments, made en route to the Irish Open tournament at Trump International Golf Links in Doonbeg, underscore his propensity for intervening in other countries’ political affairs. Still, his suggestion for Irish unification — a deeply sensitive topic — pale in comparison to his military campaigns abroad and the overt threats he has made to other sovereign nations.
Trump’s remarks were met with immediate pushback in the U.K. across the political spectrum.
“Northern Ireland’s constitutional future will be decided by the people of Northern Ireland, not by commentary in London, Dublin or Washington,” Gavin Robinson, leader for Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party and a member of the U.K. Parliament, said. “As unionists we are not interested in the destruction of our country by joining with the Irish Republic.”
Kemi Badenoch, who leads the Conservative Party in Parliament, likened Trump’s comments about Northern Ireland to his threats of annexing Canada and Greenland.
“President Trump is shooting from the hip as usual, just like he did with Greenland and Canada becoming the 51st state,” she said on X. “This sort of loose talk about the future of democratic countries is deeply unhelpful and creates unnecessary tension.”
Rupert Lowe, another member of Parliament and leader of the far-right party Restore Britain, dismissed Trump’s comments as “unacceptable” and “insulting.”
Under the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, the British government must call a border poll if a majority of people in Northern Ireland appears interested in voting for Irish unification.
Britain’s new Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, said last month that a referendum on Northern Ireland leaving the U.K. was “off the table.” But Trump on Saturday suggested that Irish unification was inevitable.
“The way I look at it, it’s going to happen eventually. It may as well happen now. You got the right man over here to get it moving,” he said, gesturing at Martin.
The taoiseach’s spokesperson later told The Irish Times that there would be no changes to government policy. “No, our Good Friday Agreement and Programme for Government commitments remain,” the spokesperson said.
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