DUBLIN — Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald has ruled out running for Ireland’s presidency — and her Irish republican party might opt not to run a candidate at all.
McDonald’s decision, announced Monday after months of speculation, could set the scene for Sinn Féin to throw its support behind the candidacy of independent socialist Catherine Connolly. She is one of only two confirmed candidates in the race to become Ireland’s next head of state in the Oct. 24 election.
But some within the once-militant party are hoping, instead, for a surprise return of its former leader, Gerry Adams, who retired from politics in 2018 to be replaced by his hand-picked successor, McDonald.
Sinn Féin leaders are meeting Monday in the Dublin suburb of Dún Laoghaire to discuss, behind closed doors, who — if anyone — should be their candidate.
Ahead of that meeting, McDonald told RTÉ radio it wouldn’t be her — and stressed the party wouldn’t announce its decision until a final Sept. 20 meeting, four days before the nomination period closes.
The 56-year-old McDonald said she must stay focused, as opposition leader in the Dáil Éireann parliament, on winning Ireland’s next general election. This may not happen until 2029.
According to an opinion poll of the party’s own members, 17 percent had hoped to see McDonald, a Dubliner, run for president. The next most popular options were the 76-year-old Adams, the Belfast native who led Sinn Féin for 35 years; First Minister Michelle O’Neill, who leads the Northern Ireland government now; and McDonald’s deputy leader in the Dáil, Pearse Doherty, who hails from the republic’s northernmost county of Donegal.
Sinn Féin finished a narrow third in last November’s election, leaving the two centrist establishment parties, Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil, in coalition government together.
While McDonald said she didn’t want to prejudge the outcome of Sinn Féin’s internal debate, she pointedly praised Connolly for her strong anti-Israel and pro-Gaza views and her most recent comments, delivered in Belfast, on uniting Ireland.
Like Connolly, Sinn Féin is ardently pro-Palestinian.
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