{"id":474157,"date":"2026-05-08T03:58:15","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T03:58:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/474157\/"},"modified":"2026-05-08T03:58:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T03:58:15","slug":"on-the-doors-with-malachy-steenson-in-dublin-central","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/474157\/","title":{"rendered":"On the doors with Malachy Steenson in Dublin Central"},"content":{"rendered":"

The result of the Dublin-Central by-election is highly important, as it will reveal if support for the immigration critical movement \u201cis real or not\u201d, said Cllr. Malachy Steenson, as he canvassed through the inner city this week.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Walking through North Strand alongside campaign volunteers, with a Gript journalist embedded to observe, Steenson described the election as a test of whether the rise in immigration-sceptical politics represented a genuine electoral movement or simply online momentum.<\/p>\n

The Councillor, who was elected to Dublin City Council in 2024, is running on a platform focused on immigration, housing, public services and cost of living pressures. Over the course of several hours on the doors, those themes surfaced repeatedly in conversations with residents.<\/p>\n

Steenson was recognised constantly while canvassing, with many passers-by stopping to greet him by name.<\/p>\n

\u201cAh, Malachy,\u201d one woman shouted from across the street.<\/p>\n

\u201cI always vote for you number 1, all the time!\u201d<\/p>\n

Even among those who disagreed with him politically, Steenson said the atmosphere had changed noticeably compared to previous campaigns, and one female campaign staffer said canvassing had become far less hostile.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been a big difference from the locals to now,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were getting called all kinds of names the last time. It\u2019s completely different now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked why she thought attitudes had shifted, she pointed to recent comments from Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin linking homelessness pressures to immigration.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think a lot more people are after waking up,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow the Government are agreeing with what Malachy said and jumping on the bandwagon.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBut will it benefit them? I doubt it very much, because Malachy\u2019s been saying this since 2022. But now it\u2019s seen as \u2018safe\u2019 to say it, because it\u2019s not just us saying it. It\u2019s even people like Miche\u00e1l Martin.\u201d<\/p>\n

Immigration arose organically on the doors throughout the evening. At one house, a resident asked Steenson directly: \u201cWhen are you closing the borders?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAs soon as I get in,\u201d Steenson joked, adding: \u201cI\u2019ll close the border to the Southside as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAh good, we never wanted them up here anyway,\u201d the man laughed, before turning serious.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou name a place where a Dublin man can get a job in Dublin.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t, unless he works for himself,\u201d Steenson replied.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere you go,\u201d the man responded.<\/p>\n

Gript put it to Steenson that Sinn F\u00e9in candidate Cllr. Janice Boylan had said immigration was not emerging regularly on the doors during her own canvass.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf that\u2019s true, it\u2019s probably because people wouldn\u2019t bother raising it with her,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

On Gerry Hutch\u2019s controversial immigration comments that illegal immigrants should be interned, Steenson said that these remarks by Hutch were only designed to generate headlines and publicity.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough I\u2019ve no difficulty interning people, and this State has never had any difficulty interning people,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Steenson argued that immigration remained tied to nearly every major issue being discussed during the campaign.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe media want you to think it\u2019s gone off the boil,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut none of the problems we have can be solved without solving the immigration problem.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t solve the housing problem without solving the immigration problem, because you can\u2019t continue to increase demand. You have to take the stopper out of the bath at some stage, or turn off the tap \u2013 one or the other.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said Government parties were now attempting to adopt tougher rhetoric after years of dismissing criticism.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey tried to steal our clothes,\u201d he said, referring to the immigration-critical protest groups which he said used to be criticised by the main political parties.<\/p>\n

Asked whether recent Government concessions on immigration pressures made him feel vindicated, Steenson rejected the suggestion.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t say vindicated is the right word,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cBecause we\u2019ve always been right. They\u2019re accepting now that we were right, but they knew all along that we were right.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey were just denying it for their own political reasons.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked if he was concerned recent Government immigration pivots might placate some voters enough to win back support, he said he wasn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe people who\u2019d be placated by that level of measure wouldn\u2019t have been voting for us anyway,\u201d he said, adding that people could \u201csee through it\u201d.<\/p>\n

While most interactions were positive and friendly, there was some pushback \u2013 one man stepped out from his house after spotting the canvassers approaching.<\/p>\n

\u201cGo away, he\u2019s a racist,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

One volunteer asked him how Steenson was racist.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy wife is an immigrant! He\u2019d deport her!\u201d the man replied.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo he wouldn\u2019t,\u201d the canvasser said, asking: \u201cGive me one thing he\u2019s said that\u2019s racist.\u201d<\/p>\n

The man paused, muttered briefly to himself, and returned indoors.<\/p>\n

The canvass frequently drifted beyond immigration and into broader questions about the changing character of the constituency itself.<\/p>\n

Passing through one street, Steenson pointed to what he described as growing gentrification in the locality.<\/p>\n

\u201cGentrification is changing the nature of the area,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s doing almost as much damage, in some ways, as immigration is.\u201d<\/p>\n

He laughed: \u201cWe have immigrants from the southside coming up now.\u201d<\/p>\n

One campaign staffer gestured towards a nearby caf\u00e9.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnce you start seeing the coffee shops pop up, you know you\u2019re doomed,\u201d he joked.<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah,\u201d Steenson replied.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019d be more tea drinkers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Later, he pointed towards a \u201cNorth Strand welcomes all\u201d mural featuring a transgender flag.<\/p>\n

Steenson claimed the mural had been funded by Dublin City Council and installed by Leftwing activists in response to anti-immigration \u201cSays No\u201d protests held in the area with Irish tricolours.<\/p>\n

The conversation soon turned to the political make-up of Dublin Central, where Sinn F\u00e9in, Labour and the Social Democrats currently hold the constituency\u2019s three occupied D\u00e1il seats.<\/p>\n

Steenson argued that many Leftwing parties no longer represented traditional working class politics.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey want to decriminalise drugs in the most drug destroyed area of the country, and they want to give your kid a needle to bang up a bit of gear,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy is that? Probably because they\u2019re banging coke up their nose at the weekends. And that\u2019s the biggest problem with the liberal Left. They only want to legalise drugs because they don\u2019t want to get done for having a bag of coke.\u201d<\/p>\n

He also criticised Sinn F\u00e9in\u2019s stance on immigration, claiming the party had alienated some long-time supporters.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf Sinn F\u00e9in had supported us from the start, they would be in Government now,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cTheir place in Government has been lost because of immigration. They wonder why people call Sinn F\u00e9in \u2018traitors\u2019 in areas like this. It\u2019s because they always believed that Sinn F\u00e9in had their back.\u201d<\/p>\n

One exchange later in the canvass reflected the constituency\u2019s political divide.<\/p>\n

As Steenson discussed landlords and Sinn F\u00e9in, two Sinn F\u00e9in supporting women sitting in a nearby car interrupted.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat was that about Sinn F\u00e9in?\u201d one woman asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re a landlord yourself. You\u2019re giving out about landlords but you\u2019re one.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAh get out of it, go administer British rule,\u201d Steenson shot back.<\/p>\n

\u201cIs that what 3,000 people died for?\u201d<\/p>\n

After the exchange, he defended his ownership of property.<\/p>\n

\u201cI get no money from the properties I own,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve a house that my daughter lives in, the office my sister lives in. But the Left despise success, unless you get it by being the CEO of an NGO.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the canvass drew on into the evening, Steenson said the campaign itself reflected how much political debate around immigration had changed in recent years. He said that whether or not he got elected, his primary objective in politics was to change the narrative, and he feels he\u2019s largely achieved that.<\/p>\n

The Dublin Central by-election is being contested by candidates from Fine Gael, Fianna F\u00e1il, Sinn F\u00e9in, Labour, the Social Democrats, People Before Profit, the Green Party, Aont\u00fa, and a range of Independent groupings. Immigration, housing, public services and cost of living pressures have emerged as recurring themes throughout the campaign.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The result of the Dublin-Central by-election is highly important, as it will reveal if support for the immigration…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":474158,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[4391,9,10,21989,49927,18,13,14,6,19,17,11,12,15,16,5,790,201706,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-474157","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-ben-scallan","9":"tag-breaking-news","10":"tag-breakingnews","11":"tag-council","12":"tag-dail","13":"tag-eire","14":"tag-featured-news","15":"tag-featurednews","16":"tag-headlines","17":"tag-ie","18":"tag-ireland","19":"tag-latest-news","20":"tag-latestnews","21":"tag-main-news","22":"tag-mainnews","23":"tag-news","24":"tag-politics","25":"tag-seanad","26":"tag-top-stories","27":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116536954569827589","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/474157","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=474157"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/474157\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/474158"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=474157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=474157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=474157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}