Trump blimp coming to Ireland for US president’s visit

The Trump baby blimp is coming to Ireland for the visit of US president Donald Trump in November.

The organisers of the original blimp said they will “definitely” be bringing it to Ireland for President Trump’s visit and are working with several groups to decide how, and where, it will be used.

"We have had expressions of interest from a number of different groups and we have yet to say conclusively who we will work with," said Kevin Smith who calls himself one of the Trump "babysitters".

“We want the Trump baby to be wherever Trump is. If that’s in Dublin or on the golf course, we want it to be there. We really have been inspired by what is happening in Ireland in recent years with all the popular displays of people power like things such as abortion rights and gay marriage. Ireland is a really exciting place to be on the streets right now.”

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The orange blimp features Mr Trump as a crybaby and wearing a nappy. The €10,000, 6m-high installation was crowdfunded and massively oversubscribed. It flew in Parliament Square during the president's visit to the United Kingdom in July.

Green Party leader Eamon Ryan, who is one of the organisers of the Irish protests, said the blimp will be part of a programme of events around the Trump visit.

He said the protests aimed to do something visually striking that will convey to the American television networks that Irish people do not want Mr Trump visiting Ireland. Mr Ryan said the protests may include a nighttime candlelit vigil in Dublin and will have an “Irish twist”.

“We are working through the details. We will be doing different things in different parts of the country. It won’t just be Dublin. We will be doing Cork and Dublin and other locations.”

Mr Ryan said it is unlikely there will be any protests outside Mr Trump's resort in Doonbeg where the president is expected to make a private visit.

However, he said he would like to do something at Daniel O’Connell’s statue in Ennis. “I think it is that tradition. We have that tradition of mass rallies going back to the 19th century,” he said.

“O’Connell is connected to the American constitutional tradition. We have got to do something that just doesn’t add to the hate and division that Trump likes in protests . . . How do you do it in a way that slightly undermines that? It is the tradition of O’Connell that I would be looking at. Let us do something that is full of colour and humour. That does require numbers,” added Mr Ryan.