{"id":46582,"date":"2025-09-06T03:54:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-06T03:54:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/46582\/"},"modified":"2025-09-06T03:54:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-06T03:54:08","slug":"cork-td-james-oconnor-backs-mep-billy-kellehers-bid-for-fianna-fail-presidential-nomination","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/46582\/","title":{"rendered":"Cork TD James O\u2019Connor backs MEP Billy Kelleher\u2019s bid for Fianna F\u00e1il presidential nomination"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cork East TD James O\u2019Connor has declared his support for Ireland South MEP Billy Kelleher\u2019s underdog campaign to secure the Fianna F\u00e1il nomination for next month\u2019s presidential election.<\/p>\n

Mr O\u2019Connor\u2019s support, announced just before the party\u2019s deadline for nominations, gave Mr Kelleher one vote more than he needed for the threshold of five endorsements.<\/p>\n

Mr O\u2019Connor joins TDs P\u00e1draig O\u2019Sullivan and Peter \u2018Chap\u2019 Cleere, senator Paul Daly, and MEP Barry Andrews in publicly supporting Mr Kelleher.<\/p>\n

Fianna F\u00e1il\u2019s 71 parliamentary party members will decide on Tuesday between Mr Kelleher and former Dublin football manager Jim Gavin, who has been endorsed by Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin and currently has 31 declared votes.<\/p>\n

To win, 36 votes are needed, and 34 are still undeclared.<\/p>\n

Mr O\u2019Connor told The Echo that Mr Kelleher had broad, if undeclared, support across the parliamentary party.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a Cork man, as a Fianna F\u00e1il TD, I am very proud to support one of our own in Billy Kelleher,\u201d said Mr O\u2019Connor.<\/p>\n

Mr Kelleher, meanwhile, said he would be engaging with party colleagues ahead of the vote.<\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe purpose of this is to ensure that we have an interrogation of the candidates, that we have an interrogation of ideas and values, and that we put forward a candidate that actually reflects the Fianna Fail values that we want to take into the campaign.\u201d\u00a0\n <\/p>\n

Speaking to RT\u00c9\u2019s Six One News, he said: \u201cI think it\u2019s important in a democratic party like Fianna Fail, that we do have a healthy debate.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Asked about whether he believes he will be successful, given that Mr Gavin had 31 public endorsements when only 36 is needed for a majority, Mr Kelleher said: \u201cThat\u2019s the beauty about the process \u2013 in the sense that it is going to be a secret ballot.\u201d<\/p>\n

The MEP rejected claims that a vote for him would undermine Mr Martin\u2019s leadership and added that he was unaware of Mr Gavin\u2019s interest when he first approached the idea of running.<\/p>\n

Asked if he would not have put himself forward if he had known about the leadership\u2019s support for Mr Gavin, Mr Kelleher said:\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n \u201cI still believe that there should be a contest. I don\u2019t believe in coronations.\n <\/p>\n

\u201cI think we have to get people into the ring. They have to be able to present and articulate their views, to express themselves.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Pressed on whether he was saying that Mr Gavin could not do that, he replied: \u201cI can only speak for myself. I speak regularly. I engage with colleagues, I have been debating my entire life. I stand on my record.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, former weather forecaster Joanna Donnelly and Riverdance star Michael Flatley announced they were no longer pursuing their bids for the office.<\/p>\n

Mr Flatley said he had to put his family and health first, adding: \u201cI feel I can better serve the Irish people by continuing my work promoting Ireland and Irish culture globally.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ms Donnelly told supporters she came to understand she was \u201cunderprepared\u201d for a tilt at the \u00c1ras, saying in a social media post: \u201cI was naive to think I could meet the challenges of the campaign.\u201d <\/p>\n

To get on the ballot for the October 24 presidential election, candidates need the nominations of 20 Oireachtas members or four of Ireland\u2019s 31 local authorities.<\/p>\n

So far, Galway East left-wing Independent TD Catherine Connolly has secured sufficient Oireachtas nominations, while Fine Gael has declared former minister Heather Humphreys as its candidate.<\/p>\n

The presidential election will be held on Friday October 24.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cork East TD James O\u2019Connor has declared his support for Ireland South MEP Billy Kelleher\u2019s underdog campaign to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":46583,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[9,10,18,13,14,6,19,17,11,12,15,16,5,59,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-46582","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-eire","11":"tag-featured-news","12":"tag-featurednews","13":"tag-headlines","14":"tag-ie","15":"tag-ireland","16":"tag-latest-news","17":"tag-latestnews","18":"tag-main-news","19":"tag-mainnews","20":"tag-news","21":"tag-presidential-election","22":"tag-top-stories","23":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46582","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=46582"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46582\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46583"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46582"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46582"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46582"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}