Taoiseach: acting US AG Sally Yates woman of ‘great courage’

The Taoiseach has praised acting US attorney general Sally Yates who has been sacked by president Donald Trump for refusing to implement his travel policy.

Enda Kenny has also dismissed renewed calls to cancel his meeting with the president in the House on St Patrick's Day as the "populist question''. He repeated he intended going to the White and speaking "directly'' to the president.

Ms Yates, an Obama administration appointee, was dismissed when she declined to implement the president’s order banning nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the US.

Mr Kenny told the Dáil on Tuesday he thought Ms Yates was a woman of great courage. “I think she stood up for what she believed in here,’’ he added.

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Mr Kenny said it was a matter of interpreting US legislation and the country’s constitution.

He understood, he said, Ms Yates considered the matter very carefully over the weekend and wrote what she believed in.

He also understood the dismissal letter was handed to her at 9pm and the White House issued its statement two minutes later. The newly-appointed acting attorney general then signed the order.

He said he recognised Ms Yates had courage and was not afraid to stand up for her belief in the legislation and constitution of the US.

Earlier, Labour leader Brendan Howlin said Ireland needed to take a stand and the Taoiseach should acknowledge it was not business as usual.

The House should forge a common view and make it clear the great majority of the Irish people found what Donald Trump had done, and proposed to do, anathema, he added.

Labour TD Joan Burton said the weekend had marked the anniversary of the holocaust, the implementation of which began with people required to carry papers on passports signed in Nazi Germany.

AAA-PBP TD Ruth Coppinger recalled Mr Kenny had said last summer that Mr Trump was racist and dangerous.

She suggested it would be “rank hypocrisy’’ on Mr Kenny’s part to go to the White House, adding it would probably be his last “bowl of shamrock’’ as Taoiseach.

“I, frankly, don’t believe you will look Donald Trump in the eye and convey the anger of Irish people and that of most decent people in the world,’’ she added.