Why are we protesting Trump’s visit to Ireland?

September 2, 2026

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Why are we marching against Trump? In short, because he represents everything that we are not.

At ActionAid Ireland, our work is built around a fairly simple but increasingly radical idea, that everyone should be able to live a life with dignity, safety and freedom, no matter who they are. We believe that those in power should make these things happen, make the world better, be accountable and understand dignity.

As a women’s rights organisation we know that women are nearly always the hardest hit by the challenges facing the world. We work globally with communities experiencing the impacts of poverty, conflict, displacement and climate change. We campaign to challenge and change the systems that make the world unfair, keep people poor and women’s rights sidelined.

Here’s 5 reasons why we are protesting Trump’s visit

Trump and women’s rights

He has been found civilly liable for sexual abuse. He has repeatedly used degrading and misogynistic language about women, particularly female journalists. He has fraternised with renowned sexual abusers. His hostility to women’s rights however goes far beyond his own misogynistic behaviour.

Trump appointed three of the Supreme Court judges who overturned Roe v Wade, ending the federal constitutional right to abortion, and has repeatedly taken credit for it. Internationally, his administration has consistently opposed agreed language on gender and sexual and reproductive rights and has removed vital funding for women’s rights throughout the world.

Trump and climate justice

The man who said at the United Nations in September 2025 that climate is the “greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world” has unsurprisingly consistently undermined climate action at every turn. He withdrew the United States from the Paris Climate Agreement. He has since gone further, directing the US to withdraw from the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change itself, as well as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the International Renewable Energy Agency.

Domestically, he has pushed aggressively for more oil and gas production while rolling back support for renewables. His 2025 tax law accelerated the phase-out of major wind and solar tax credits, while his administration has expanded support for oil, gas and LNG infrastructure. In February 2026 the Environmental Protection Agency scrapped the finding that greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare and removed federal greenhouse-gas standards for cars and trucks — an action the EPA itself described as the “single largest deregulatory action in U.S. history.”

Trump and international law

Trump’s administration is right now attacking the International Criminal Court, the very institution which was established in order to hold those accused of the gravest crimes to account. Trumps, Secretary of State Marco Rubio has recently said the administration intends to “systematically dismantle” the International Criminal Court.

In Palestine, Trump has continued to back Netanyahu and the Israeli government as they continue their genocide against Palestinians in Gaza and their apartheid regime in the West Bank. Trump’s ‘Board of Peace’ in Gaza is an insult to the lives of Palestinians after a brutal and relentless genocide. For the wider Middle East, more than 175 children and teachers were killed on the first day of the conflict following a strike by the US on a girl’s school in Iran, with no accountability from the US. From Palestine to Iran to Greenland to Venezuela, the pattern with Trump and his administration is the same, international law is optional and largely ignored.

Trump and global solidarity

One of Trump’s first acts after returning to office was to freeze US foreign assistance which has now led to the entire dismantling of USAID. The effect of these cuts on people around the world is catastrophic. Since early 2025, the loss of USAID funding has led to an estimated 700,000 deaths. By 2030, according to a study by the Lancet, it is estimated as many as 14 million people could die, including 4.5 million children under age 5 if the current cuts continue.

Trump also reinstated the Global Gag Rule, which means that organisations who were receiving US funding could not provide, refer people for, or advocate for abortion services, even if they did so using their own money. In 2026, his administration has expanded this much further. The restrictions now also target work on LGBTQI+ rights and diversity and inclusion. This means that for example organisations who were providing lifesaving HIV/ AIDS treatment to marginalised communities have now had their funding cut.

Trump and the human rights of the most marginalised

Attacking the most marginalised in society has become a defining feature of Trump’s politics. This is no more evident than in his migration policies. His administration has pursued mass deportations, restricted access to asylum and dramatically expanded immigration detention, while migrants are routinely described in dehumanising ways directly from the Oval Office.

Trans people have been another deliberate target. On his first day back in office, Trump ordered the US government to recognise only two sexes and began removing recognition of gender identity across federal policy. Since then, his administration has continued to strip back protections for trans people and repeatedly used them as a political punching bag.

Whether it is migrants, trans people or people from countries he considers undesirable, Trump consistently punches down in the way only a bully does.

That is why we are protesting Donald Trump.

Come join us at 13.00 on September 12^th at Garden of Remembrance. Register here and we can send you all the details and keep in touch ahead of the march.

Protestors at COP 28 in Dubai. Photo: Konrad Skotnicki.

Belfast Climate Change March, 2019. Photo: Trócaire.

The Profit Driving the Crisis

Despite their overwhelming contribution to global emissions, fossil fuel companies continue to attract significant financial backing—driven by their enduring profitability. This is starkly illustrated by the case of ExxonMobil, the top fossil fuel investment held by asset managers based in Ireland. In 2023, ExxonMobil reported €33.63 billion ($36 billion) in profit. That is almost twice the GDP of Botswana (€18.1 billion) and nearly three times Namibia’s GDP (€11.5 billion).

Ireland plays a hugely disproportionate role in facilitating investments into fossil fuel companies like ExxonMobil. In 2023, the investments made into fossil fuel companies by investment managers based in Ireland generated an estimated 72.5 million tons of CO2e. This is more than the CO2e emissions for the entire country of Ireland—and more than ten times that generated by Sierra Leone.

The Global Human Impact

The climate crisis is here, now, and it is causing disproportionate harm in the Global South. In Bangladesh, rising sea levels and increasingly severe cyclones are displacing coastal communities, with projections indicating that 17% of the entire country could be underwater by 2050. The legally binding Paris Agreement on climate change explicitly acknowledges the importance of tackling private finance. Its three overarching goals are: keeping below 1.5C of warming; increasing adaptation and making finance flows consistent with low emissions and resilience.

This gives a clear mandate for action: both tax reform and corporate regulation are needed to tackle financial flows, and both nationally in Ireland and at EU level, ‘polluter pays’ taxes are lacking and regulation of the financial sector remains weak and fragmented. While EU regulation exists, it is designed more to nudge investors toward more sustainable investment practices by increasing transparency and reporting levels than to enforce strict standards. And it is moving in the wrong direction: the recently passed EU Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive excluded investments; and now the EU Commission’s Omnibus legislative proposal threatens to undo the limited gains made on climate plans, as well as blocking future attempts for stronger action at national level.

The Risk of Inaction

Fossil fuel investment is too profitable to remain weakly regulated. If Ireland continues with its current strategy of encouraging FDI at all costs, and relying on weak EU regulation, we are headed for catastrophe. The Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change has repeatedly warned that every fraction of a degree beyond 1.5°C brings irreversible consequences: collapsed ice sheets, vanishing coral reefs, and extreme weather events that will make vast regions of the planet uninhabitable. And yet, companies are developing oil and gas fields that could push global warming beyond 2°C.

Our research found that 91% of the investments made into fossil fuel companies by investment managers based in Ireland were to companies that have plans for fossil fuel expansion like these. Ireland cannot afford inaction on this issue.

About This Research

The figures in this report regarding investment from Ireland are based on new research commissioned by ActionAid Ireland and Trócaire. In the paper, we uncover the scale of fossil fuel investment through Ireland, who the investors are, and in which fossil fuel companies they are investing. We analyse the current regulatory framework and explain why it is inadequate—and moving in the wrong direction. And we make specific recommendations for change, which are summarised below.

Summary of Recommendations

Regulate the private financial sector
Ireland must end its outsized role as an enabler of destructive fossil fuel investment. Ireland should introduce a strong gender-responsive national human rights and environmental due diligence framework which includes the regulation of investors with respect to human rights and the environment and climate. The transposition of the EU Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive could achieve this if downstream activities are included and the Omnibus proposal is rejected. Ireland should prohibit investments in fossil fuel expansion and require investors to implement climate transition plans consistent with a 1.5°C climate limit.

Endorse the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty
Ireland should endorse developing a Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty to curb fossil fuel expansion and commit to a fair and funded phase out of fossil fuels.

Support tax justice
Ireland should support bold and fair new global tax rules through the UN Framework Convention on Tax, should adopt all OECD BEPS measures, and should conduct an updated and comprehensive spillover analysis of its tax policy. Ireland should take coordinated action globally, at the EU level and domestically to introduce a range of new taxes to mobilise finance needed for climate justice, based on ‘polluter pays’ and social equity principles such as wealth taxes for the highest earners, climate damages tax on investors, fossil fuel production taxes and levies on aviation and shipping.

Finance a just transition
Ireland must also meet its fair share climate finance obligations under Article 9.1 of the Paris Agreement, and pay our ecological debt to the Global South. Ireland should support conditionality-free debt cancellation for countries on the front lines of the climate crisis, commit to a new UN Framework Convention on Sovereign Debt, moving debt negotiations from the IMF to the UN, and to a debt workout mechanism that is fully representative and fair.