{"id":144984,"date":"2025-10-25T17:56:14","date_gmt":"2025-10-25T17:56:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/144984\/"},"modified":"2025-10-25T17:56:14","modified_gmt":"2025-10-25T17:56:14","slug":"spoiled-ballots-hit-unprecedented-level-as-voters-express-frustration-at-choice-of-candidates-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/144984\/","title":{"rendered":"Spoiled ballots hit unprecedented level as voters express frustration at choice of candidates \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">The number of people who spoiled their votes in the presidential election reached unprecedented levels as large numbers of voters expressed anger at the choice of candidates on the ballot and the exclusion of others.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Early in counting on Saturday, it became clear from tallies that the percentage of spoiled votes could reach record levels. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Large numbers of spoiled votes were cast in working-class areas in particular, though significant numbers  appeared in most boxes across all 43 constituencies.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The number of spoiled votes was set to surpass 200,000 &#8211; the highest number cast in a modern Irish election &#8211; or more than 14 per cent of the vote, based on first count results in 40 of the 43 constituencies as of 6pm on Saturday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">At the last 2018 presidential election, spoiled votes totalled 18,438, accounting for 1.2 per cent of the total. Just over 1 per cent of votes were spoiled in the 2011 presidential election.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">At the RDS in Dublin, where the majority of the votes in Dublin were counted, a number of ballots with \u201cnot my president\u201d, \u201cshe was only 10\u2033 and \u201cMaria Steen No 1\u2033 could be seen. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Steen, a conservative campaigner, failed to secure a nomination, falling two short of the required 20 Oireachtas members to get her name on the ballot.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-it-article-body__interstitial-link\">[\u00a0<a aria-label=\"Open related story\" class=\"c-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/politics\/2025\/10\/25\/irish-presidential-election-count-results-catherine-connolly-heather-humphreys\/\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Follow live updates: presidential election countOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">The reference \u201cshe was only 10\u2033 related  to a 26-year-old man who is alleged to have assaulted a 10-year-old girl in Saggart, west Dublin outside an accommodation centre for asylum seekers. The man is before the courts and cannot be identified due to the nature of the charge against him.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"A spoiled vote in Killarney, Co Kerry among many of those emerging from boxes around the country on Saturday morning \" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/F5RA74JY2VFKZCNUHYZODBBPSM.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"1066\"\/>A spoiled vote in Killarney, Co Kerry among many of those emerging from boxes around the country on Saturday morning  <img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"Spoiled votes from the Dublin South West count centre as the first boxes are being opened for counting of presidential votes at Dublins RDS count centre. Photograph: Alan Betson&#10;&#10;\" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/X7TF32GSQRAV5E22M3RN5MA23M.JPG\"   width=\"800\" height=\"533\"\/>Spoiled votes from the Dublin South West count centre as the first boxes are being opened for counting of presidential votes at Dublins RDS count centre. Photograph: Alan Betson<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Other spoiled votes had \u201cConnor\u201d, \u201cDustin the Turkey\u201d, \u201cDonald Trump\u201d and \u201cIpas centres out of here\u201d written on them.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">A tally of a box from Cherry Orchard in west Dublin included 120 spoiled votes, with about 130 first preferences for Catherine Connolly, 11 for Heather Humphreys and just one for Jim Gavin.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">A box from Chapelizod, in the Dublin South Central constituency, included a spoiled ballot that had images of Maria Steen and Nick Delahanty stuck on to the sheet of paper and \u201cfiasco\u201d written at the top.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"A spoiled vote in Sligo-Leitrim \" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/FGVU5MGFQZEM7LL6762IHCVIYA.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"1066\"\/>A spoiled vote in Sligo-Leitrim  <img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"A spoiled vote in Sligo-Leitrim\" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/HOGTAJTDFBDVHDJLLD4AZJFPQA.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"1066\"\/>A spoiled vote in Sligo-Leitrim <img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"Spoiled votes from boxes at Dublin's RDS count centre. Photograph: Dan Dennison\" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/HJLZYBO3EVH5ND5DH3NFGR3TMY.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"533\"\/>Spoiled votes from boxes at Dublin&#8217;s RDS count centre. Photograph: Dan Dennison <img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"Spoiled votes from boxes at Dublin's RDS count centre. Photograph: Dan Dennison \" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/RAVSQGBR35GGTLTG7BTAUIQ6XI.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"533\"\/>Spoiled votes from boxes at Dublin&#8217;s RDS count centre. Photograph: Dan Dennison  <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Labour leader <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/ivana-bacik\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/ivana-bacik\/\">Ivana Bacik<\/a> expressed concern about what she described as an orchestrated spoiled-vote campaign.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">She described the campaign as \u201creally concerning and an undermining of democracy\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">\u201cI\u2019m really alarmed to see the level of vitriol and the messages that are being written on the ballot papers,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cIt is some sort of orchestrated campaign here,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Conceding defeat to Connolly, Humphreys said it was \u201cunfortunate people spoiled their votes\u201d. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cSome people were upset by the number of candidates. I had expected that there would be more. I am sure that Catherine thought the same,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cMaybe that is something that should be looked at but that is a matter for Government.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The number of people who spoiled their votes in the presidential election reached unprecedented levels as large numbers&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":144985,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[9,10,1921,18,13,14,6,555,19,17,11,12,15,16,5,59,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-144984","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-catherine-connolly","11":"tag-eire","12":"tag-featured-news","13":"tag-featurednews","14":"tag-headlines","15":"tag-heather-humphreys","16":"tag-ie","17":"tag-ireland","18":"tag-latest-news","19":"tag-latestnews","20":"tag-main-news","21":"tag-mainnews","22":"tag-news","23":"tag-presidential-election","24":"tag-top-stories","25":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115436099126855201","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=144984"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144984\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/144985"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=144984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=144984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=144984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}