{"id":455690,"date":"2026-04-27T05:45:21","date_gmt":"2026-04-27T05:45:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/455690\/"},"modified":"2026-04-27T05:45:21","modified_gmt":"2026-04-27T05:45:21","slug":"mary-lou-mcdonald-claims-immigration-abuse-aimed-at-sinn-fein-driven-by-non-supporters-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/455690\/","title":{"rendered":"Mary Lou McDonald claims immigration abuse aimed at Sinn F\u00e9in driven by non-supporters \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sinn F\u00e9in<\/a> leader Mary Lou McDonald<\/a> has claimed that the abuse her party has received on the issue of immigration is driven by people who don\u2019t want her party to replace Fianna F\u00e1il<\/a> and Fine Gael<\/a>. <\/p>\n

During the party\u2019s ardfheis in Belfast this weekend, spokesman on justice Matt Carthy said that Sinn F\u00e9in \u201cdid make mistakes\u201d in its handling of the issue of immigration, and that it should have been \u201cfar clearer, much sooner\u201d about where it stood.<\/p>\n

On Sunday, McDonald was asked about abuse she had received from anti-immigration protesters in Dublin who had branded her a \u201ctraitor\u201d. <\/p>\n

In response, the opposition leader claimed that the abuse of Sinn F\u00e9in\u2019s position on immigration was coming from a small minority who wanted Fianna F\u00e1il and Fine Gael to remain in power. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere has been a very concerted effort by some \u2013 it\u2019s a tiny number of people, but they are very loud \u2013 to shout lots of people down, it seems particularly me. And I often question, what\u2019s the actual motive of these people? … It seems to me that their actual problem is the prospect of Sinn F\u00e9in being a strong, large party with the potential to replace Fianna F\u00e1il and Fine Gael in Government. But that\u2019s their business,\u201d McDonald told RTE\u2019s The Week in Politics programme. <\/p>\n

In a separate interview on Sunday, McDonald denied that she had undermined the trade union movement when her party offered support to fuel protesters who had engaged in blockades of key infrastructure. <\/p>\n

She claimed that Dublin\u2019s inner city felt safer for women when protesters were blocking off O\u2019Connell street. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere was protesters on O\u2019Connell Street, in the heart of my own constituency, and I have to say, talking to people who live in the inner city, particularly women who\u2019d be out going to jobs and that early in the morning, they said they never felt more safe on O\u2019Connell Street then when the lads were there with their tractors,\u201d McDonald told RT\u00c9 Radio 1\u2019s This Week programme. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sinn F\u00e9in leader Mary Lou McDonald has claimed that the abuse her party has received on the issue…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":455691,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[9,10,52,18,13,14,6,19,56,17,11,12,15,16,16594,108361,5,47,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-455690","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-dublin","11":"tag-eire","12":"tag-featured-news","13":"tag-featurednews","14":"tag-headlines","15":"tag-ie","16":"tag-immigration","17":"tag-ireland","18":"tag-latest-news","19":"tag-latestnews","20":"tag-main-news","21":"tag-mainnews","22":"tag-mary-lou-mcdonald","23":"tag-matt-carthy","24":"tag-news","25":"tag-sinn-fein","26":"tag-top-stories","27":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116475089746274960","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455690","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=455690"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455690\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/455691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=455690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=455690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=455690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}