The Irish-American population has always been seen as quite an influential group, but that might be changing.

All eyes have been on US President Trump's trip to Ireland for the Irish Open, and stheome of the comments he's made have raised a few eyebrows.

One comment was about his hopes for a united Ireland, with many wondering was this an attempt at influencing the Irish-American vote in the US's upcoming mid-term elections.

However, when speaking to The Pat Kenny Show, BBC's Catríona Perry explained how the Irish influence in the US needs to be preserved due to the ageing population of that cohort.

When asked if the Irish influence is still palpable, she explained: "It is, yeah. There's plenty of Irish-American surnames. There's plenty of support for Ireland.

"The main problem would be that that's an ageing population, and that's a big challenge for the government, is, you know, how to kind of future-proof that influence so that all of the people who speak a lot about Irish America aren't sort of, in their later years.

"You're trying to protect the next generation coming up. That's been problematic because immigration from Ireland to the US has really narrowed down over the last few decades, really.

"It's not that recent a phenomenon, but people's experience, their lived experience from Ireland, it's moving generations and generations older, and then it's harder to keep that.

"But there's still a big draw for Ireland, and, you know, our Foreign Service, our diplomats, whatever the persuasion, work really hard to try and protect that."

When meeting Micheál Martin in Farmleigh House, President Trump was asked about his views on the unification of Ireland, and he responded positively to the idea.

However, he later admitted while at the US Ambassador's residence that he might get into some trouble over those comments, but he did feel it would be a wonderful thing to see.