Trump says Ireland 'cheats' the US in White House meeting with prime minister

US president Donald Trump added Ireland to the list of countries he says are taking advantage of his own as he welcomed Irish Taoiseach Micheál Martin to the White House. 

Trump has been sparring with US allies and adversaries alike over trade, slapping tariffs on imports from countries from Canada to China and beyond and creating major diplomatic rifts in the process.

During an appearance with Martin in front of reporters, Trump repeated his claim that the European Union was created to take advantage of the US. 

Asked if Ireland was also taking advantage, Trump replied, “of course they are".

"I have great respect for Ireland and what they did and they should have done just what they did, but the United States shouldn’t have let it happen," he complained.  

Trump specifically referred to the concentration of US pharmaceutical companies in Ireland, a longstanding situation grounded in the country's notoriously lenient corporation tax laws.

“We had stupid leaders. We had leaders that didn’t have a clue, or let’s say they weren’t businesspeople, but they didn’t have a clue what was happening and all of a sudden Ireland has our pharmaceutical companies," Trump said.

Martin countered Trump's allegations by insisting that the two countries' trade relationship is “a two-way street”, adding that Ireland's two major airlines buy more aircraft from Boeing than any other foreign customer and that hundreds of Irish companies were based in America, creating thousands of jobs.

“That's a little-known fact that doesn't turn up in the statistics,” he added.   

“I understand where you're coming from, fully. But I think it's a relationship that we can develop and that will endure into the future.”