Trump’s unpredictability means St Patrick’s Day at the White House has the potential to backfire |
Ireland has a truly special relationship with the United States. Historically tens of thousands of people left poverty, hunger and poor prospects behind, emigrating across the Atlantic to make a new life for themselves.
Many prospered, including in business and in politics.
St Patrick’s Day stateside is a celebration of this special relationship, with parades, the greening of rivers and every imaginable manifestation of paddywhackery.
For the political class, Washington DC and the White House is where the action is. However, while once engagement with the US president was regarded as a friendly formality and a chance to present the incumbent with the traditional bowl of shamrock, Donald Trump’s presidency, coupled with geopolitical upheaval, has turned this once relatively easy gig into a potential minefield.
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Trump’s politics have also turned Irish allegiances on their head, with unionists now more eager than nationalists to seek an Oval Office audience.
Last year, we watched Taoiseach Michaél Martin sit through an unnerving fireside chat with the unpredictable president, in which the latter namechecked MMA fighter Conor McGregor, describing him as his “favourite Irishman”.
Days previous, Ukraine’s President Zelenskyy had been effectively humiliated by the bullying Trump and his sycophantic court, a fate spared the visibly tense Fianna Fáil leader.
While it was the then vice-president Joe Biden who in 2015 got into trouble for joking about orange being unwelcome at the White House, these days the colour is very much de rigueur, with the president himself proudly sporting a complexion reminiscent of a Wotsit.
Accordingly, the Stormont contingent heading to the White House this year is exclusively unionist, with First Minister Michelle O’Neill boycotting proceedings for the second year running.
Alliance leader Naomi Long has also signalled an unwillingness to indulge a president “who mocks the disabled and engages on race-baiting” and is also “the best friend of a sex trafficker”.
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Such trifles apparently don’t matter to Deputy First Minister Emma Little-Pengelly and fellow DUP ministers Paul Givan and Gordon Lyons.
Health Minister Mike Nesbitt and UUP leader Jon Burrows have also made the trip, as has Secretary of State Hillary Benn and PSNI Chief Constable Jon Boutcher.
Not having any influence over foreign or trade policy means the politicians from the north engaging with President Trump will be less inclined to challenge his often skewed world view. He’s unlikely to be taken to task over his illegal war with Iran, the Venezuelan coup, or the questionable tactics employed by Ice. Nevertheless, the potential for embarrassment or public abasement of guests is never far away.
It’s unclear what schmoozing in the White House actually achieves, and more often attendance is aimed at audiences back home, a hope that power will be transferred osmosis-like simply by shaking a presidential hand. President Trump appears to have little interest in Ireland beyond his Doonbeg resort in Co Clare, and Northern Ireland rarely, if ever, has figured in his pronouncements.
With few tangible benefits being seen to flow from the annual exodus, increasingly questions will be asked about the value - and ethics - of pandering to a president who most on this side of the Atlantic view with scorn.