Taoiseach criticises US President Donald Trump’s ‘over the top’ migration policies He admits he ‘took his eye off the ball’ around the recent Jim Gavin presidential election campaignOn farmers’ protests, he says, ‘I was very taken aback by how all of that developed’
Taoiseach Micheál Martin has vowed that he will lead Fianna Fáil into the next general election, and insisted he won’t be stepping down as leader when Simon Harris becomes taoiseach next year. After a turbulent year for his party, Mr Martin appears to have warded off any threats of a heave against him, following a disastrous presidential election campaign in which his chosen candidate, Jim Gavin, withdrew from the race. “I understand fully the anger of members of the party and the dismay at how things transpired,” he said. Mr Martin said that at the time he had been “fixated” on government policies and accepted he “took his eye off the ball” when it came to the presidency, partly due to the trade war waged by Donald Trump. “People underestimate the degree to which the Government was very consumed by navigating that,” he said, adding those matters “took up a lot of bandwidth” at the start of last year.
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