{"id":64954,"date":"2025-09-15T06:42:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-15T06:42:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/64954\/"},"modified":"2025-09-15T06:42:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-15T06:42:08","slug":"super-primary-day-will-narrow-path-for-independents-to-contest-presidential-election-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/64954\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Super primary\u2019 day will narrow path for Independents to contest presidential election \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The path for Independents to contest the presidential election<\/a> will narrow considerably today, as many councillors due to hear their candidacy pitches say endorsements are \u201chighly unlikely\u201d.<\/p>\n

Monday has been described as a \u201csuper primary\u201d day, with 11 councils due to hold special meetings to consider nominating a candidate. <\/p>\n

Three of the most prominent Independent candidates \u2013 entrepreneur Gareth Sheridan<\/a>, conservative commentator Maria Steen<\/a> and social media activist Nick Delehanty \u2013 have been intensively lobbying councillors in target local authorities over the weekend. Each needs to be formally nominated by four councils to become an official candidate in the election. <\/p>\n

Mr Sheridan looks likely to get the first of a required four nominations when Kerry County Council<\/a> votes on Monday morning. It deferred its vote after hearing from prospective candidates last week. His candidacy is being backed by Independent councillors but will depend upon abstentions from Fianna F\u00e1il<\/a> and Labour<\/a> council members.<\/p>\n

Vice-chair of the council Marie Moynihan (Labour) confirmed she would abstain in the vote. \u201cThere is a sense in the council that Gareth Sheridan might get through,\u201d she said on Sunday. <\/p>\n

During the course of Monday, 10 other councils will hear pitches from aspiring candidates hoping to gain a place on the presidential ticket. Most will vote after their meeting, although some, such as Kildare<\/a>, will defer their votes until the following week. <\/p>\n

While Fianna F\u00e1il has imposed no whip on its councillors, party members on local authorities in a number of counties told The Irish Times they are likely to show support for the party\u2019s candidate, Jim Gavin<\/a>, by voting against the nomination of others. <\/p>\n

Paschal McEvoy, a Fianna F\u00e1il member of Laois County Council<\/a>, said local representatives there will meet on Monday morning to decide on a stance. There is a view locally that the party should support its own candidate, he said. Similarly, in Longford<\/a>, Cllr S\u00e9amus Butler said there was support among Fianna F\u00e1il councillors there to refrain from endorsing a candidate other than Mr Gavin.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Lack of presidential debate in Irish \u2018disappointing\u2019, says ConnollyOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

With Fine Gael<\/a>\u2019s local authority members subject to a whipped vote, requiring them to row behind party candidate Heather Humphreys<\/a>, a Fianna F\u00e1il \u201cblock\u201d vote on any given council would effectively foreclose the possibility of a nomination. <\/p>\n

Laois is a key target for Mr Sheridan, who will address its meeting on Monday. Ms Steen is also due to address Longford County Council. <\/p>\n

They will both address Dublin City Council<\/a> at its special meeting this evening. Former MMA fighter Conor McGregor<\/a> is also scheduled to address the council and several others. <\/p>\n

In a submission Mr McGregor says he, as president, would use constitutional provisions to \u201crestore political power to the Irish citizenry\u201d.<\/p>\n

Last year, Mr McGregor was ordered to pay Nikita Hand \u20ac250,000 in damages<\/a> after a High Court jury found he had assaulted her in a Dublin hotel.<\/p>\n

In July, he lost his appeal against the jury finding<\/a> in favour of Ms Hand, who sued him over alleged rape at the Beacon hotel on December 9th, 2018.<\/p>\n

Thirteen further councils have arranged for meetings to be held ahead of the final deadline for nominations on September 24th. Indications are that a route to gaining four local authority nominations will be more difficult than it was in 2018. Yet, Fianna F\u00e1il councillors on several councils, including in Tipperary, Leitrim, Sligo and Wexford, say they are willing to consider nominations. <\/p>\n

Meanwhile, on Sunday Sinn F\u00e9in<\/a> responded to reports that its deputy leader Pearse Doherty<\/a> may be its presidential candidate by saying this is speculation. The party will announce next Saturday whether it will field a candidate of its own or will instead back Independent left-wing candidate Catherine Connolly<\/a>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The path for Independents to contest the presidential election will narrow considerably today, as many councillors due to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":64955,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[9,10,1921,4003,784,18,13,14,4771,553,25,6,19,17,19487,9824,25672,30457,11,12,45792,15,16,30253,5,9649,59,47,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-64954","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-conor-mcgregor","12":"tag-dublin-city-council","13":"tag-eire","14":"tag-featured-news","15":"tag-featurednews","16":"tag-fianna-fail","17":"tag-fine-gael","18":"tag-gareth-sheridan","19":"tag-headlines","20":"tag-ie","21":"tag-ireland","22":"tag-jim-gavin","23":"tag-kerry-county-council","24":"tag-kildare-county-council","25":"tag-laois-county-council","26":"tag-latest-news","27":"tag-latestnews","28":"tag-longford-county-council","29":"tag-main-news","30":"tag-mainnews","31":"tag-maria-steen","32":"tag-news","33":"tag-pearse-doherty","34":"tag-presidential-election","35":"tag-sinn-fein","36":"tag-top-stories","37":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64954","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=64954"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64954\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64955"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64954"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64954"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64954"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}