St Patrick can rest easy. His name – and that of old Ireland – is still good in Trumpland.
As the sun set on Washington, Taoiseach Micheál Martin could scan the crowded East Room, where the shamrock ceremony took place secure in the knowledge that he’d come through what was depicted as the defining diplomatic moment of his career. It was enough. President Trump even asked him about his late father Paddy Martin, a champion boxer and a Cork legend as they sat in the Oval office – a moment for any son of Cork city.
“He had a good defensive style,” the Taoiseach joked.
It was a description that spoke volumes.
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From the early morning breakfast assignment at the Naval Observatory, occupied by the Vance clan since January, the omens were good. Vice-president JD Vance showed off the shamrock-patterned socks he had bought for the occasion. The diplomatic wheeze may have been old but, for Martin’s party, the gesture was promising. Robert Kennedy jnr showed up, tanned and inimitably of the first Irish-American family in appearance, there to enjoy the conversation and the breakfast of fresh berries and eggs benedict. But RFK’s presence – and the ghosts of his regal Democratic lineage – was another reminder that this is a different America.
The cheerful breakfast atmosphere set the tone for the day. All the worst fears and predictions of what lay in store for the Taoiseach melted away. There were no nasty surprises – no ambush, no Burkes jumping out from behind the Resolute Desk and no lectures. Instead, Trump sounded as though he had been practising the pronunciation of his host’s first name as he welcomed “Mee-Halll Martin” to the Oval Office.
“Taoiseach of Ireland. It’s a special place and he’s a very special guy.”
Martin nodded appreciatively at this. In that moment, he must have felt like a special guy.
“He did it the hard way also,” Trump continued.
“He served and took a little time off and then he served again. I heard about that. He’s done very well and we knew each other from a long time ago.”
For his part, Martin was effusive in his thanks and commended Trump on “the work you are doing in terms of the pursuit of peace. I think that is going well. You really have, in the first one hundred days of this government done extraordinary things very quickly and everybody is watching.”
That is one way of putting it. But it was clear that Martin understood the nature of this assignment. Any guest to Trump’s White House is sucked into the vortex of his mood and the preoccupations of the moment. For the 50-minute “chat” in the Oval Office, Martin’s main duty was to listen as the host held court. The Irish leader adapted expressions of amusement and gravity and nodded significantly as Trump sent forth his cascade of thoughts on … everything. The imminent tariff war dominated the morning headlines and after asking for a question, Trump spoke for five unbroken minutes. When his attention was drawn to the $50bn trade surplus Ireland enjoys over the United States – and the suggestion that his answer may make Martin nervous, he turned to scrutinise his host.
“Well I don’t think he looks nervous to me and if he was nervous he wouldn’t show it. No, we do have a massive deficit with Ireland because Ireland was very smart. They took our pharmaceutical companies away from presidents who didn’t know what they were doing. A tremendous job – look, the Irish are smart. You are smart people and you took our pharmaceutical companies and other things, you know, through taxation and they made it very good for companies to move over there. And we had presidents involved in this who had no idea what they were doing. The European Union has treated us very badly for years. It is our turn now. We get a turn also.”
Through all of this, Martin smiled uneasily. Diplomacy is a delicate art and sometimes it’s an exercise in saying nothing. But there is also a near-invisible line between respect and obsequiousness. Martin managed to stay on the right side of that but couldn’t disguise the fact that he would say anything – or rather, adapt the classic Irish stance of saying nothing – to keep the shamrocks and goodwill flying high in the sky. That was always going to be his primary obligation.
So, when the conversation turned to the potentially thorny subject of Gaza, Martin was careful to reference his visit, a week after the October 7th attack, to Israel. And he did, with exceeding politeness, venture to say that the trade relationship with Ireland works both ways.
When Trump was asked about Ireland’s housing crisis, Martin chuckled as the president said: “You know why they have a housing crisis, because they are doing so well.”
“That’s a very good answer, Mr President,” quipped Martin, a response that will leave him open to criticism given the horrendous consequences for many of that problem at home. But later, he did identify housing as the single greatest issue facing the State. In the moment, under the pressure, he moved as lightly as he could and found enough oxygen to live with and cajole a president who can move from sunshine to belligerence in the blink of an eye.
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But not on Wednesday. Trump’s affection for Ireland was genuine in emotion, if vague in detail. He was unaware of the Sinn Féin boycott and when asked about his favourite Irish person, skipped over Yeats and Daniel O’Connell before remembering the world of MMA and “Conor”. Again, the best thing for the Irish leader to say to this was nothing.
On the Capitol, lunch was convivial. A performance troupe for Riverdance entertained the gathering. By the time Martin returned to the White House for the shamrock ceremonies, the schedule was running hopelessly late but nobody minded. The old speech line touchstones and teary salutes to the long, rich Irish-US historical ties were addressed from the podium.
Behind Trump’s green velvet tones and smiles, of course, is the steely determination to punish Europe for what he sees as its wilful economic exploitation of the United States. What that means for Ireland is still shrouded in ifs and buts. First and foremost, the two-time president and the man who has taken Republican ideology in a startlingly new direction is a ruthless businessman. Economic storms may await but as Trump reminisced about the “very special people ... I knew a lot of Irish growing up in New York”, the clouds did not seem quite so ominous.”
Former president John F Kennedy famously claimed that “if the day was clear enough” you could see from Galway Bay to Boston. By Wednesday night, the two shorelines seemed a bit closer again.
