Irish American politicians working with Donald Trump should have more awareness of how Irish people had been treated in the 19th and 20th centuries in the US and elsewhere, according to an Irish Labour party senator who made headlines after calling Trump a “fascist”.

“[Historically] we were the ones who were called terrorists when bombs were going off [in the UK],” Aodhán Ó Ríordáin told the Guardian in an interview. “You call someone a terrorist or give an impression that a certain entire religious faith is connected with terrorism and that’s really undermining.”

Ó Ríordáin pointed to Trump confidants embracing their Irish cultural heritage. The speaker of the house, Paul Ryan, vice-president, Mike Pence, and White House press secretary, were among those touting their Irish heritage on Thursday in anticipation of St Patrick’s Day.

Paul Ryan took a very small sip of a suspect-looking pint of Guinness as he praised the US-Ireland relationship, while Pence used the phrase “Top of the morning” to greet Kenny.

Ó Ríordáin said there were distinct parallels between the plight of Irish people through history and that of both undocumented immigrants in the US and those seeking asylum to the country, and that US politicians embracing that culture should tone down their rhetoric.

“We have an immigrant story to tell. We are an immigrant nation, there are more Irish people born outside of Ireland than there are in Ireland,” Ó Ríordáin said.

Ó Ríordáin will hold an anti-Trump, pro-immigrant rally in New York City on Friday night. “Irish Stand” is due to take place in the same Upper West Side church where Martin Luther King gave his famous speech opposing the Vietnam war, two days after Trump’s latest travel ban barring immigrants from six Muslim-majority countries was blocked by courts.

Aodhán Ó Ríordáin will hold an anti-Trump, pro-immigrant rally in New York on Friday. Photograph: Niall Carson/PA

“We know exactly what it means to leave to seek refuge. We used to leave Ireland on what they call coffin ships – as in you get on this and you may not survive. That’s exactly what the Syrians are doing.

“We were the ones who had religious bigotry that we had to overcome.”

Ó Ríordáin rose to international acclaim after he gave an impassioned speech in Seanad Eireann, the upper tier of the Irish legislature, after Trump’s election victory in November.

“I don’t use the word fascist lightly but what else would you call somebody who threatens to imprison his political opponents?” Ó Ríordáin told the Seanad. The speech has been watched more than 3.3m times on the senator’s Facebook page alone.

Irish Stand, backed by the American Civil Liberties Union and celebrities including Rosie O’Donnell and Martina Navratilova, aims to “remind” the Trump administration “that the international community rejects the politics of division and fear”.

As well as Irish artists such as the author Colum McCann and comedian Maeve Higgins, the event will also include contributions from Imam Shamsi Ali, a director at the Jamaica Muslim Center in Queens, New York, while Ó Ríordáin said Black Lives Matter activists were among the endorsees.

Ó Ríordáin said the timing of the event was due to coincide with a “perfect storm” in the US, given the visit of Ireland’s taoiseach, Enda Kenny, to the White House on Thursday, St Patrick’s Day, the attempted introduction of Trump’s latest travel ban and the number of Irish Americans working with Trump.

“We see what’s coming into effect now. You see the travel ban coming into effect and it’s fundamentally, in my view, racist. You see the heavy emphasis on immigrant crime,” he said.