Shortly after setting foot in Dublin, President Trump on Saturday said it would be “fantastic” if Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland unified, breaking with decades of U.S. neutrality on an issue rooted in a long history of violence.
“I don’t want to cause any problem. I will tell you, I’d love to see it unified,” Mr. Trump said in Dublin alongside Micheál Martin, Ireland’s taoiseach, or prime minister. “It’s going to happen eventually.”
He later seemed to acknowledge that he had stepped into a politically problematic topic.
The American president said he still believed it would “be a cool thing” if Northern Ireland broke away from the United Kingdom, but joked that half the room would clear out after hearing his remarks.
“No matter how well you say it, there’s no good answer,” Mr. Trump told a crowd of embassy employees and business leaders gathered at Deerfield Residence, where the U.S. ambassador lives.
The United States has long supported the U.S.-brokered 1998 Belfast Agreement, also known as the Good Friday Agreement, which ended roughly three decades of violence between those seeking a united Ireland and unionists who wanted Northern Ireland to remain a part of the United Kingdom.
Part of that deal was that Northern Ireland would remain part of the United Kingdom until a majority of its people voted otherwise in a referendum.
In keeping with his freewheeling approach to the global stage, Mr. Trump has mused about the unification of Ireland before. Earlier this year, he suggested there should be a “merger” between Northern Ireland and Ireland because of how well Mr. Martin got along with Northern Ireland’s deputy first minister, Emma Little-Pengelly. She later said the comment was made in jest and should not be taken seriously.
Mr. Trump’s comment on Saturday came just days after Andy Burnham, the recently elected British prime minister, said there was not enough public support for a referendum on Northern Ireland leaving the United Kingdom and until there was “there will not be one.” Mr. Trump himself acknowledged on Saturday that the government in London would most likely “have something to say about” about his comments on reunification.
Patrick Dwyer-Cummins, a spokesman for 10 Downing Street, said that Mr. Burnham’s position remained unchanged and he was committed to upholding the Good Friday Agreement.
But Mr. Trump’s comment did indeed prompt some immediate criticism.
Gavin Robinson, the leader of Northern Ireland’s main pro-union party, said on social media that “President Trump knows better than most that elections matter.”
“Northern Ireland’s constitutional future will be decided by the people of Northern Ireland, not by commentary in London, Dublin or Washington,” he said. “Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom because that is the settled democratic will of its people.”
The reference to reunification was not the only unconventional aspect of Mr. Trump’s remarks.
American presidents, when speaking overseas, typically have refrained from lacing into their domestic rivals. But Mr. Trump used his speech in Dublin to repeatedly attack Democrats, including describing former President Joseph R. Biden Jr., who has cancer, as physically infirm. Mr. Biden, who has Irish ancestry, traveled to Northern Ireland in 2023 to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement.
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