Senior economic advisor to Donald Trump, Stephen Moore, has confirmed he expects US multinationals to leave Ireland and relocate back in the US.

Mr Moore, who sparked controversy with similar comments earlier this week, confirmed the new US administration would cut the US business tax from 35% to 15% to stimulate business investment – and said they learned that lesson from Ireland.

Speaking to RTE’s Marian Finucane today, he said: “We want to emulate Ireland. We want to be competitive with Ireland.”

He said that when the US slashes its business tax, “We do think a lot of companies that have left the US will come back (including) from Ireland.”

“A good way to stimulate more business investment is to cut our business tax – we learned that from Ireland,” he added.

And repeating a Trump mantra he said: “We’re going to put America first.”

Mr Moore (pictured, in an image from Fox TV) said he did not know what role he would have in the new Trump administration.

Earlier this week, Dr Declan Jordan in UCC’s Department of Economics said the touted reduction in corporation tax is in fact unlikely to lead to the return of multinationals to the US, and would actually worsen the US’ economic outlook.

US will cut corporate tax rate from 35% to 15%, Trump advisor says