{"id":400194,"date":"2026-04-15T18:33:14","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T18:33:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/400194\/"},"modified":"2026-04-15T18:33:14","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T18:33:14","slug":"no-irreparable-damage-to-us-ireland-relations-says-ambassador-to-european-union-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/400194\/","title":{"rendered":"No \u2018irreparable damage\u2019 to US-Ireland relations, says ambassador to European Union \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

United States<\/a> ambassador to the European Union Andrew Puzder<\/a> has said that if the US-Republic relationship has been damaged by recent differences, there has not been \u201cirreparable damage\u201d. <\/p>\n

Puzder also insisted that ties between the two countries remain deep and strong.<\/p>\n

The ambassador is in Ireland for meetings in advance of the State\u2019s EU presidency<\/a>, with which he says the US is anxious to help, despite evident hostility to the EU by the Trump administration.<\/p>\n

Asked if the Republic-United States relationship had been damaged, Puzder replied: \u201cI\u2019m not going to tell you whether there was damage or not … I don\u2019t think there was irreparable damage. But, you know, you don\u2019t have to agree with us on everything. And you don\u2019t have to agree with President Trump on everything.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Iran, he said Trump had taken the steps he felt necessary, and that there was no political advantage in doing so. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe Democrats, you know, they\u2019re going to criticise him, whatever he does. And … the Maga [Make America Great Again] movement who supports him, they don\u2019t want to get involved in wars overseas either,\u201d he said on Wednesday. \u201cSo if he made the decision to do this, particularly with a midterm election coming up, the only explanation is that … he believed this was the right thing to do. And I think people will see the wisdom of that over time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Striking a diplomatic tone not always evident in Washington, Puzder said that the US wanted to see Europe succeed economically because it considered Europe an important ally and trading partner. <\/p>\n

\"AndrewAndrew Puzder has said Donald Trump will ‘say what\u2019s on his mind … He will not hold back.’ Photograph: Reuters <\/p>\n

He praised European Parliament president Roberta Metsola and Commission president Ursula von der Leyen as \u201cobviously a very brilliant, talented woman\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cLook, we want, America wants the European Union, and Europe in general, to be prosperous. Prosperous Europe is a better trade partner, a prosperous Europe is better able to defend itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

But he said Europe had fallen behind on artificial intelligence (AI). <\/p>\n

\u201cTo be part of the AI economy, you have to look at what\u2019s necessary to be in the AI economy. You need energy, you need critical minerals. You need data centres, you need data, and you need the American AI hardware stack,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He also said that Europe would continue to require fossil fuels.<\/p>\n

However, Puzder\u2019s most consistent message was that Europe needed to reduce regulation in order to improve its competitiveness. Many US companies consider EU regulations a significant barrier to expansion and trade. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou know, it\u2019s Meta. It\u2019s Google. The American tech companies. And they come into my office at the embassy and say, \u2018You know, ambassador, can you help us? We love Europe … But every time we turn around, it\u2019s another regulation, or they move the goalpost, or there\u2019s a $100 million fine. And it\u2019s very hard to grow in Europe while we have those impediments\u2019,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Asked about the Trump administration\u2019s willingness to support parties in Europe \u2013 such as vice-president JD Vance campaigning unsuccessfully for Viktor Orb\u00e1n in the recent Hungarian election \u2013 Puzder said: \u201cIf you\u2019re asking me if you can expect President Trump to say what\u2019s on his mind in the future, yes, you can expect that. He will absolutely say what\u2019s on his mind in the future. He will not hold back.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, he declined to be drawn on the recent spat between Trump and Pope Leo. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to look at what the president says and what the pope says, and if they disagree, they disagree … I don\u2019t know what else to say. They don\u2019t have to agree on everything.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"United States ambassador to the European Union Andrew Puzder has said that if the US-Republic relationship has been…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":400195,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[969,2244,61,60,43,1713,90],"class_list":["post-400194","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-donald-trump","tag-eu","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news","tag-ursula-von-der-leyen","tag-us"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400194","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=400194"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400194\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/400195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=400194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=400194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=400194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}