A Baptist pastor notorious for his antisemitic and homophobic views has become the first person ever to be banned from entering Ireland.

Steven L Anderson, who is based in Arizona and runs the Faithful Word Baptist church, has previously described Jews as “anti-Christs” and produced videos promoting denial of the Holocaust.

He also found notoriety after admitting he prayed for the death of former US President Barack Obama and praised the gunman who killed 49 people in a shooting at a Florida gay club in 2016.

The pastor had been due to visit Dublin to deliver a sermon on May 26, but on Sunday Justice Minister Charlie Flanagan signed an order excluding him from the Republic of Ireland.

Section 4 of the country's Immigration Act allows the minister to sign an exclusion order if he “considers it necessary in the interest of national security or public policy”.

“I have signed the exclusion order under my executive powers in the interests of public policy,” Mr Flanagan told the Irish Times.

Mr Anderson is an active preacher on YouTube and has published videos with titles including “How to Hate a Jew” and “No Such Thing as ‘ANTI-SEMITIC’”.

Mr Anderson is already banned from travelling to several other countries, including the UK.

In 2016 he was deported from Botswana as a “prohibited immigrant” after telling a radio station in the country that gay people should be killed.