Taoiseach Micheal Martin said he has a duty to protect Irish jobs and workers as he defended plans to travel to Washington DC to meet with the US president as part of the St Patrick’s Day events.

Describing the economic relationship between Ireland and the US as “extremely significant”, Mr Martin said it is worth around one trillion euro, with some 220,000 jobs nationwide connected to US companies.

It comes after People Before Profit TD Ruth Coppinger claimed that Mr Martin’s traditional trip to Washington is “normalising President (Donald) Trump” and his claims to take over the Gaza Strip.

Speaking in the Dail, Ms Coppinger told Mr Martin that his trip to the US capital is an “error of judgment”.

However, Mr Martin defended the decision to make the annual trip, saying he cannot ignore a “huge part of our economy”.

“St Patrick’s Day for many years been a very substantive opportunity and occasion for Ireland, globally and in the United States, to engage with decision makers to engage with its own communities, diaspora, a very substantial diaspora in the United States,” Mr Martin told the Dail.

“It’s extremely important that we continue to work with our diaspora, but that we also work on our relationship with the United States.

“President Trump is democratically elected.

“He’s elected by the people of the United States, and one cannot ignore that reality.

“The economic relationship between Ireland and the United States is extremely significant, it’s a trillion euros.

“There are about 220,000 jobs in Ireland, dependent people, workers who work in us, multinational companies, and a further 170,000 associated jobs.

“So it’s a huge part of our economy.

“Now, Irish companies create about 115,000 jobs in the United States, and there are opportunities for Irish companies who export to the United States as well.

“Now you’re asking me to ignore all of that.

“I’m always intrigued quite a hard left approach, which just ignores our economic model and just somehow thinks it’s going to happen anyway.

“You probably don’t agree with it, if you’re honest, you’re more interested in the concept of working people, in terms of the conceptual, but not actually the workers.

“You want me literally to jettison any concern for the workers in this country, ignore any risks to their lives, and just plough ahead being virtuous and having a particular view.

“But I have a duty as Taoiseach also to protect workers in this country and to protect economic relationships with other countries, not just (the) United States, but other countries with whom we may not agree with in terms of their policies and orientation.

“In our view, we need to consolidate the ceasefire. That’s the most important issue right now for people in Gaza. Hamas need to release the hostages. They do and the Hamas role in this has been malign, and that needs to be acknowledged.”

Ms Coppinger stated that an economic policy that is dependent on “staying silent on genocide” is a “flawed” one.

“When you say, consolidate the ceasefire, what Trump has announced doesn’t consolidate a ceasefire.

“It makes it much more likely that the right-wing Zionists will actually not keep to a ceasefire, because he’s opened up the prospect now of taking over Gaza, something that they’ve always wished for,” the Dublin West TD said.

“The diaspora is very important.

“I never mentioned once that we shouldn’t meet the diaspora worldwide. I actually said we should make links. We should show solidarity.

“Would you accept you made an error of judgment before when you went to Israel in the very early days of the genocide and you pointed to a ceiling on a roof while Gaza was being flattened.

“Would you agree that if you go again and greet Trump and smile and hand over a bowl of shamrock, you’ll be making another error of judgment.”