Donald Trump’s return to the White House presents Ireland with major challenges at a time when Ireland’s political influence in Washington DC is arguably at its lowest ebb.
The reversal of America’s bipartisan consensus in support of free trade is now complete. This carries major risks considering that the US is Ireland’s largest export market, with €54 billion worth of Irish goods heading there in 2023.
Well-publicised comments about the imbalance in US-Irish trade by the incoming Commerce Secretary as well as President Trump’s trade tsar point to difficult discussions ahead.
One sign of the changing mood can be seen in how a mainstream Republican like the next Secretary of State Marco Rubio lambastes “[f]ree-market fundamentalists” while calling for more support for domestic industry.
This is not a Trump policy; it is the American policy, broadly backed by both parties there, and the world needs to get used to this.
Similar changes are afoot in the security sphere. As has already been the case in recent administrations, America is shifting its focus from Europe to the Asia/Pacific region.
At the precise moment in history when Ireland is beginning to take its defence responsibilities seriously, the major guarantor of European security since 1945 is likely to spend less time and effort in protecting this region from external threats. Irish neutrality was only made possible by an American blanket which is possibly about to be pulled off.
Aside from trade and security, there are many other issues where Ireland will need to be able to put its case effectively to the incoming administration in the coming years.
All this work will have to be done at a time when Ireland’s political strength in Washington’s halls of power is much reduced.
There is no doubt that Ireland still possesses significant soft power internationally. Every country has a national day, and yet hardly any of them are marked annually by a meeting between their prime minister and the US President in the Oval Office.
This has a lot to do with the size of the Irish-American diaspora, but is more a legacy of the political genius of the Irish exiles, who dominated politics in major cities like New York, Boston and Chicago in a way no other ethnic group could.
Long after the Irish influx had receded, the fruits of this remained visible.
Case-in-point: on the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated, the US President, the Senate Majority Leader (Mike Mansfield), the House Speaker (John McCormack) and the Chair of the Democratic National Committee (John Bailey) were all Irish-Americans.
The decline in Irish immigration coupled with the increase in overall immigration into an ever more diverse America weakened Irish influence over time.
When America supported free trade and viewed Europe as a priority, this was not a major problem, but this is no longer the case.
Worse still, Ireland has become culturally and politically disconnected from its own diaspora at the time it needs them most.
The fact that so many Irish-Americans support the Republican Party clearly irritates many in Official Ireland, who appear to spend each American presidential election season hoping for a Democratic victory.
This has been noticed. The former envoy to the US Congress John Deasy recently wrote of the perception of senior elected Republicans “that the official Irish presence in Washington was heavily biased towards the Democratic party” – a perception which is surely correct.
Deasy also wrote that Irish contacts among Republicans in the Senate were “non-existent.”
This is particularly serious, given the crucial role that the Senate plays in foreign affairs; during Trump’s first term, a key Republican Senator torpedoed a bill which could have given thousands of Irish applicants work visas in the US each year.
Not having friends on Capitol Hill matters, particularly given how strong a position the Republicans are now in.
Trump’s multi-ethnic winning coalition points to a bright future for the Republicans. Moreover, the structure of the electoral system favours them.
Of the 50 American states, 24 are solidly red, meaning that almost half the Senate is Republican even before the decisive battles are fought in the current seven swing states.
Republicans also have a major advantage in the electoral college, given that the red states are gaining in population, and will likely receive more congressional seats and electoral college votes after 2030.
The Democratic hegemony which many in Ireland wish for has not happened and is not likely to either.
It is time to stop wishing for a different America and to start building stronger ties with the one which actually exists.
Thankfully, there appears to be some recognition that things need to change.
The Programme for Government promises an “increased diplomatic presence across the US, particularly in a number of southern states to ensure we are best placed to influence, anticipate and respond to any planned changes by the new US Administration.”
A decision to engage more with Red State America is exactly right, but it does not get to the root of the recent alienation.
If Irish politicians and diplomats were unable to connect effectively with Republicans in Washington DC, what makes them think they can do so in Texas or Florida?
The problem to address is not the location of diplomatic engagement, but the form it takes. In particular, a devoutly progressive political Irish establishment has consciously decided to ignore many of the key reasons why Ireland and America will be forever linked, namely religion.
For many Irish-Americans, their Catholic identity is a core component of how they see the world, and why they look favourably upon their Irish roots.
Polls suggest Trump won thumping majorities of Catholics, and a poll focused solely on Irish-American voters would likely yield similar results.
SOFT POWER RESTS ON A RELIGIOUS FOUNDATION
Aside from St. Patrick’s Day itself, much of Ireland’s soft power rests upon a religious foundation.
America’s Catholic Church – its parishes, its schools, its universities and its hospitals – was built by Irish hands. To stand in St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Manhattan and read the names and stories of the 10 Irish Catholics who have reigned as Archbishop is to understand a reality that has been avoided for too long.
Like many European nations, Ireland had a global empire, but ours was spiritual.
Fintan O’Toole’s befuddlement as to why Joe Biden could look back on his Irish Catholic upbringing and identity with such affection speaks volumes about the cultural divide which has taken root.
During President Biden’s visit here in 2023, left-wing Ireland’s leading intellectual pondered aloud as to why Irish-Americans could recall a “parochial Catholic world…with a simple, uncomplicated fondness that is almost impossible now in Ireland.”
Understanding and appreciating the unique spiritual connection between Ireland and the Irish Catholic diaspora in what is still an abnormally religious country by Western standards would go some way to reconnecting with a demographic which still has affection for Ireland, but which often feels alienated from the secular country it is now.
Alternatively, Ireland could continue in its self-consciously Woke path, and see the distance between it and the world’s greatest power grow further.
Ireland’s diaspora is of course not uniformly Catholic. In fact, as a country, we have failed to properly tap into the Scots-Irish diaspora.
Those Protestant emigrants who sailed away from Ulster found a new home on the American frontier in places such as Appalachia, before forging ‘Hillbilly Highways’ across their new country.
As many as 27 million Americans count themselves as being at least partially Scots-Irish, including the new Vice President, whose ‘Hillbilly Elegy’ memoir is a lament for a struggling people disconnected from the affluence of those major American cities which Irish observers too often limit their focus to.
The Scots-Irish are a much harder cohort to connect with than Irish Catholics.
They did not stay in one place upon arrival, and nor did they mostly remain in the Presbyterian religion which many of the Ulstermen had originally adhered to.
American Protestantism is naturally fissile. Given that the Scots-Irish are not linked together by any one religious institution – no sacraments serving as life landmarks, no shared memory of a religious school system – it is unsurprising that the connection between Ireland and the Scots-Irish is vastly weaker than the connection which we still enjoy with Catholic Irish-America.
With the Programme for Government promising a strategy “to grow the Irish Diaspora in the US,” and with Vice President Vance being just one of many Scots-Irish in important positions, this is one cohort which we need to do more with.
They deserve the attention. As described in David Hackett Fischer’s magisterial ‘Albion’s Seed,’ the libertarian spirit of this community in religion, politics and culture played an enormous role in shaping what America would become, for good and ill alike.
A wise approach by Ireland would be to invest time and resources in raising awareness of these links on both sides of the Atlantic: promoting history, organising events and supporting museums dedicated to this history.
Given the Ulster Protestant connection, such an effort could be a natural cross-border project, or could possibly be funded as part of the Shared Island Initiative.
Ireland needs America; all Europe does. We cannot hope to influence that great nation’s decisions without first winning friends within the party which now rules.
It is is well past time to put fashionable anti-American and anti-Republican sentiment aside, and to cherish all of our historical ties.