Mattie McGrath Urges Acceptance of US President-Elect

Look, I think it's vitally important that we have strong and indeed meaningful engagements with every country in the world, for that matter. And I believe that I had a citizen in Clonmel, and I want to thank former Minister Coveney and different ministers for foreign affairs that helped out, indeed, former Taoiseach, because the gentleman that was incarcerated there was from Clonmel, but his wife actually, when he was incarcerated for so many years, she moved to Dublin, she was pleasantly informed when I raised it here about Taoiseach Baradka that his wife was a constituent of Taoiseach. So it was so important, and it's supposed to be got from the Department of Foreign Affairs and the engagement, because that man went to hell and back. And a situation that did not have his own making. Worked for a company, a Clonmel company, and unfortunately, like the crash here, there was a crash, and he happened to be the paymaster of paying the bill. He was deemed to be responsible, and there was no justice over there. No 90-day wait for your money or whatever. He was incarcerated as responsible for his company's inability to pay homes, whoever. But it's so, so important. I want to thank the Department of Foreign Affairs officials and indeed the embassies around the world. I think it had another person lately turned out, thank God, Donald Shaffer, my own constituency, was missing in this part of the world as well. Thankfully, he's turned up safely. But again, the embassy stood ready to help. And that's why on the day, I suppose, that we have it, which I indulge in, and now me too, Congress will aid the President-elect of America. And we must recognize the democracy out there. And we must accept and work with whoever the President of any country is. As one of the first democracies, and we've admired it for years, and we saw all the shenanigans in the last number of years. Now that's passed. The people have spoken. And not only have the people spoken, I believe, and I haven't been watching it, but the different states, the electoral colleges have spoken, and there will be a President-elect with clear victory in all areas. And I did say to Tito Harris earlier, when I had my phone arrived in, a lovely picture that he'd decided to tweet, a picture of a baseball cap that arrived in his office, according to his own words, with Miss Harris on it. So he was electioneering for the candidate there. So not only that, but in 2015, when he was a young minister, he made a ferocious attack. And at that time he wasn't President, but he was aiming to be President Trump, former President Trump, now President-elect, and said that any day, the office is a good day when he's a different opinion, different views to Donald Trump and Elon Musk. So Elon Musk has to be arraigned anyway, no one has a private businessman, as is, I suppose, former President Trump. But, you need to be very careful, I said earlier, you have to praise the British as you go over. I would suggest now that, and he's made a recent statement again, in the same lines, very ill-taught, ill-judged to be making comments when there was an election process going on over there. There's one starting here, when he gets the courage to blow the whistle, and we don't want interference from abroad. And, because we have to work with all governments. Yes. Yes, I am focused on remaining, and I think, and we need to send this legislation across, but I'm just making a general point that our leaders here need to be careful, what do you wish for, and we don't want to be putting flags. And we, I would encourage now, the President, the teacher, and indeed the Government, to congratulate the early opportunity, President-elect Trump, and invite him to Ireland, and look for an early meeting with him. He was over a meeting with President Biden recently, with senior IDA officials and others to, to try and maintain the good relationship. I'm thinking from South Tipperary, and Clermalla, and indeed West Waterford, and Gravenham, where we have about 9,000 American, from direct investment jobs. And we value those jobs. Merck, Shepard and Dorn are there with almost 55 years. And we need to keep those down, and we need to have proper channels of communication with all embassies. Presently, what you're talking about is not relevant to this debate. Well, it's not relevant. I think we need... We're talking about criminal... Yes, yes. And please... I'm asking... I'm asking the... Where individuals... Where individuals... Listen, the election is over. We can all get over ourselves, and accept that we have a President now elected. We have to work with him. And we need American... But what if it says, where we have so many of our diaspora out there, and we need to have relations with them, to help us in different parts of the world as well. Thank you. Thank you, Tim.