The tenth Irish presidential election has recently come down to two actively campaigning candidates – Catherine Connolly and Heather Humphreys – following the withdrawal of Jim Gavin. Yet the building blocks of the presidential election rest in the nomination process. As election season progresses, the nomination system continues to be a controversial process which lays the foundation for the final public decision of the Irish head of state.
Amidst the 2025 election, the presidential nomination has sparked ongoing debate, questioning the inherently democratic nature of the process itself. This election is the first in over fifty years where only two candidates are actively campaigning and only three are on the ballot. In the 2018 election, the ballot saw a total of six candidates. This stark decline in available candidates prompts the question: is the nomination process limiting the public’s right to choose their president? The baseline requirements to run for president are minimal: one must be an Irish citizen aged 35 years or older. But in order to be officially nominated as a candidate, there are a myriad of more requirements. There are two routes one can take: to be nominated by twenty members of the Oireachtas, out of the 174 Teachtaí Dála (TDs) and 60 senators, or be nominated by a minimum of four local authorities. The only exception remains if one is a former or returning president, in which they have the ability to nominate themselves.
The potential issues with these nomination requirements came into more intensified interrogation this past month. Maria Steen, a conservative candidate who campaigned as an Independent, secured 18 out of the 20 signatures from TDs and Senators, ultimately leading to her failure to secure a candidacy. On the final days leading up to the nomination deadline, a group of Independent senators who had been classified as potential nominators for her chose not to commit to Steen’s nomination. While this may seem to be a fair choice for these individual Senators to make, Steen’s supporters and her post-nomination remarks expressed disdain for the process. The primary qualm rests in the fact that although Steen successfully received 90 per cent of the necessary signatures from members of the Oireachtas, she now cannot be an option for voters on October 25th. Independent Ireland, the party backing Steen, then claimed that the presidential nomination process must be entirely reformed as it is “an affront to democracy”. The party has begun the process of drafting a bill to ensure that securing presidential nomination is effectively more accessible.
Businessman Gareth Sheridan experienced a similar halt in presidential hopes: he secured the support of two county councils, only reaching half of what was necessary. The frustration with the subsequent lack of choice on the ballot is now echoed not only through Independent politicians, but across the public as well. According to the October 16th Ipsos/B&A poll, 6 per cent of respondents claimed they plan to spoil their vote. A spoiled vote is a ballot that is not counted as a preference for any candidate. This can occur due to ineligibility or unclear errors on the ballot, but the choice has gained traction as a deliberate act of protest against the lack of choice in the current election. The same Ipsos/B&A poll found that 49 per cent of respondents say they do not feel represented by the selected candidates.
This much is clear: the nomination process can lead to restrictive outcomes that leave some of the public feeling unrepresented. While this is an issue worthy of time and attention, the claim that the entirety of the nomination process is undemocratic is an erroneous one. The nomination process is intentionally designed to curate a candidate standard and ensure relevant qualifications, as designed in the Constitution approved by the Irish public in 1937. Independent Ireland and Sheridan’s claims that the process is undermining the entire Irish democracy seems to circulate more concern than necessary. The party’s proposal to change the nomination process plans to update the number of Oireachtas nominations to reflect Ireland’s EU membership, with nominations requiring support from TDs, Senators, and Members of the European Parliament (MEPs). The proposal plans to change the council nominations by requiring nomination from 80 individual councillors from across the country, rather than the need for 4 collective council decisions.
This proposition regarding changing the Oireachtas nominations to include MEPs seems far-fetched, as the ceremonial role of President certainly includes the domestic support of EU policy agendas, but remains primarily integral for at-home decision making. Furthermore, the Oireachtas nomination route has only become more attainable over time as it consistently aligns with the growing population size’s representation in the Dáil, so it logically represents the domestic population. The function of the Oireachtas vote is one of a functional indirect democracy: this doesn’t render the system entirely undemocratic. Alice Moynihan, a final year Philosophy and English student explains that “constituents vote for their representatives at all levels of government as well as their local councillors. They are delegates for their constituents and as such any decision they make in relation to nominating a candidate is democratic.” While the outright claim that the nomination process is undemocratic is drastic, propositions to amend the council nomination route are worthy of consideration. This system can lead to thwarting a candidate that has significant support among councillors but does not secure a majority in a collective council. The potential of a local majority easily preventing a minority from the right to run a candidate poses a restrictive decision-making process.
In terms of tangible change coming the nomination process, a referendum is unlikely given the government’s ongoing hesitancy to engage in Constitutional amendments throughout the past year. Following Steen and Independent Ireland’s stark criticism, Taoiseach Micheál Martin has entirely rejected the criticism and “anti-democratic” claims. In contrast, Connolly expressed an open-minded opinion supporting further debate about the efficacy of the nomination process. The claim that the nomination process is inherently undemocratic is reaching too far: the system is still rooted in representation of the public for what is primarily a state figurehead. With this said, there is room for changes to the nomination process to ensure that political parties do not manipulate who ends up on the ballot.
