PRESIDENT of the United States Donald Trump has accused Ireland of taking jobs from the US in a bizarre press conference.
The President was holding the press briefing on an Executive Order regarding infrastructure from the lobby of Trump Towers in New York yesterday, August 15.
However, after the briefing, the President was asked more about the fallout from his remarks on the violence in Charlottesville, Virginia after neo-Nazi, white supremacist groups clashed with an anti-fascism protest which resulted in one death.
A young woman died after a man drove his car into the crowd, killing Heather Heyer.
In his initial statement made 36 hours after the violent clash occurred, President Trump received criticism as he condemned the 'egregious display of hatred, bigotry, and violence on many sides.'
The apparent failure to explicitly denounce the white nationalist groups led to the resignation of six of the 24 committee members of the Manufacturing Council, an advisory group on American manufacturing.
As a result, the first question of yesterday's press conference from a reporter was why the President thinks the CEOs, including Intel CEO Brian Krzanich and Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier, had resigned from the council.
In response, the President said: "Because they are not taking their job seriously as it pertains to this country. We want jobs, manufacturing in this country.
"If you look at some of those people that you're talking about, they're outside of the country.
"They're having a lot of their product made outside. If you look at Merck as an example. Take a look at where their product is made. It's made outside of our country."
President Trump then appeared to take a swipe at the CEOs who were 'embarrassed' that their products had been made in Ireland.
"We want products made in the country. Now, I have to tell you, some of the folks that will leave, they are leaving out of embarrassment because they make their products outside and I've been lecturing them about you have to bring it back to this country.
"You can't do it necessarily in Ireland and all of these other places. You have to bring this work back to this country. That's what I want.
"I want manufacturing to be back into the United States so that American workers can benefit."
Previously, the President was asked about his plans for the economy, and used Ireland as an example of a country doing “an amazing job”.
Trump told The Economist: “You look at Ireland. I own a great property in Ireland that I bought during their downturn. And I give the Irish a lot, a lot of credit.
“They never raised their taxes. You know you would have thought when they were going through that really they would’ve doubled and tripled their taxes. They never raised it a penny.
“And they got through it and they are thriving now. Ireland’s done an amazing job. A lot of companies have moved to Ireland and they like it.
Following his remarks, President Trump received further criticism after he refused to explicitly hold the supremacist groups accountable for the violence.
He instead insisted that the anti-fascist group 'came charging' at the supremacists, and that he had watched footage 'much more closely' than anyone else, and he had 'no doubt' there was blame on both sides.
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