Trump plans Ireland trip for golf tournament at his Doonbeg course
President Donald Trump is scheduled to visit Ireland next month to attend the Irish Open at his golf resort in Doonbeg, County Clare, according to a White House official. The September trip is the latest example of the president combining official business with travel that benefits his family's business interests.
President Donald Trump plans to travel to Ireland next month to attend the Irish Open golf tournament at his course in Doonbeg, County Clare, according to a White House official. The trip, scheduled for Sept. 12 and 13, will include an event with U.S. embassy workers and business officials before the president attends the tournament at Trump International Golf Links Ireland.
The visit is the most recent example of how Trump blurs the line between official business and personal travel in ways that can benefit his family business. His sons have taken over day-to-day control of the Trump Organization, but the September trip once again highlights how the president has leveraged his second term to support the family's profits in a variety of ways, according to the official, who was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Trump frequently travels to golf courses he owns in Florida and New Jersey, as well as a course in Virginia just outside Washington, D.C. His course in Bedminster, New Jersey, hosted a LIV golf tournament in August. Another Trump course at Doral in South Florida is scheduled to host a PGA event, the Cadillac Championship, in March 2028. Trump has also talked about his course in Turnberry, Scotland, hosting the British Open, which it last did in 2009 before he bought the resort. A return of the British Open to that property continues to face major logistical hurdles.
Last summer, Trump went to Scotland for five days to golf at Turnberry and later inaugurated a new Trump golf course in Balmedie, Aberdeenshire. The White House refused to call that midsummer trip a vacation, insisting it was a working trip, and Trump found time between games to discuss trade with then-British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
The president is not known to take lengthy holidays. «Don't take vacations. What's the point?» he wrote in his 2004 book, «Think Like a Billionaire.»
Trump's trip to Ireland will have him leaving the country right after he tries to rally support for Republicans in the November elections as the GOP holds its first-ever national convention ahead of the midterm elections. The unusual event, scheduled in Dallas on Sept. 9-10, was Trump's idea to galvanize support by staging something similar to the conventions both parties normally hold before presidential elections.
As recently as last summer, Trump derided Barack Obama for flying long distances for golf as president, something Trump himself is now doing. «They talked about the carbon footprint and then Obama hops onto a 747, Air Force One, and flies to Hawaii to play a round of golf and comes back,» Trump said last year.
Aside from the Scotland getaway, the longest stretch of downtime Trump took last year was when he went to his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida in early December and stayed past Christmas, though even that trip featured visits by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The trip was first confirmed by the New York Post.
