Ivan Yates was at least honest about the tactics he would need to use to get a candidate like Heather Humphreys elected president. Speaking on Newstalk, Yates said he would go "bullheaded" into a smear campaign against Catherine Connolly, asking voters, "Would you like a Provo in the park?" and whether she's a Russian asset. "Nothing works like negative campaigning," he said, in a clip that migrated from social media to newspapers, radio and television over the weekend.
Journalists – in particular those working in the broadsheet press – have facilitated the approach former Fine Gael minister Yates advocated, with outlets like the Irish Independent and the Irish Times running a series of asinine stories aimed at damaging Connolly's reputation.
We've learnt she may not be suitable for the job because she upheld her legal obligations as a barrister to work with whoever sought to employ her. Stories have resurfaced about someone she met while visiting a warzone in 2018. And most cynically we’ve had attempts to use a recent remark from Connolly to manufacture outrage on behalf of a completely imaginary sexual assault victim.
Faced with the ludicrous question of whether she might consider hiring someone convicted of rape, Connolly said she would need to think about it. If my party had cut funding for rape crisis services during austerity, as both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael did, I'd be reluctant to comment. But that didn't stop Jennifer Carroll MacNeill. "A presidential candidate who employs a person convicted by the Special Criminal Court to work for them in the Oireachtas and to then consider hiring a convicted rapist for the Áras is not fit to be our president ," said the health minister in a hastily issued statement attacking Connolly for taking a moment think about her answer. "How can Mary Lou McDonald, Ivana Bacik and Holly Cairns back a candidate who said she would need to reflect on whether she would hire a convicted rapist to work in Áras an Uachtaráin?"
Connolly later said she would not employ anyone on the sex offenders' register. Too late. The papers had their headline. This is how character assassinations work: ask loaded questions in bad faith, reduce the answers to soundbites devoid of context or nuance, wait for ministers to burp out condemnations to keep the story alive. The manufactured scandal becomes a campaign issue. It gets mentioned in debates. The fourth estate in action – degrading public debate while congratulating themselves for their integral role in the functioning of democracy.
Beyond left and right
Heather Humphreys spent more than a decade in government, with roles like minister for social protection, minister for rural and community development and, briefly, minister for justice. Think of the politics of these governments and their attempted water charges, their refusal to build public housing on public land, their cuts to social welfare. There was Humphreys, playing her part with enthusiasm.
As social protection minister she commissioned a green paper that proposed categorising disabled people as having "profound, moderate or mild" disabilities. Those deemed capable would be forced into "reasonable offers" of employment. Disability activists – with whom Humphreys did not meet in relation to the proposal – called it "punitive" and "demeaning”. Government had to scrap it.
This is her record – something she hasn’t defended in much detail – and how she behaved when she actually held institutional power. Now she wants another gig. People living with disabilities can look forward to a “president for all”' – the same ex-minister whose department wanted them periodically reassessed to prove exactly how disabled they are.
The opposite is true of Connolly. Whenever Humphreys attacked disadvantaged people, Connolly spoke out against it. Even rivals on the right acknowledge her principles. Last week, when asked whom he favours, Independent Ireland's Michael Collins said, "I have great respect for Catherine Connolly. Our politics don't always align, but you can talk to the woman."
Collins, unapologetically of the economic and social right, has many views diametrically opposed to Connolly’s. But he respects her. Maybe it's because on certain fundamental issues she’s been consistent .
When left-wing parties backed government's disastrous 2024 referenda – which had Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael lie about advice they’d got from the attorney general and invite the electorate to vote on false pretences – Connolly pointed out their flaws.
When others argued for regressive legislation that would empower the state to jail people for words it doesn’t like, Connolly warned it would reverse "the burden of proof" while bringing in laws "wide open to abuse" by gardaí.
Connolly has also fought against the degradation of Irish neutrality and ongoing efforts to introduce Irish industry to supply chains binding prosperity to warfare. This week the Irish Times reported that government will next year increase defence spending by 11 percent to €1.49 billion, buying weapons while child homelessness hits record numbers. Though the official line refers to security concerns, what’s really happening is a state capitulation to EU and US pressure to militarise.
Like the movement against water charges, neutrality and anti-militarisation are unifying issues, supported across the political spectrum. It’s one of the reasons the Nice referendum was rejected in 2001. An Ireland Thinks poll published in January found 75 percent want to maintain current policy while an Irish Times/Ipsos poll in April found 63 percent support Ireland's model of neutrality. Even Louise Richardson, chair of the government's 2023 forum on security policy, acknowledged that 64 percent of public submissions favoured keeping the policy. Yet efforts to diminish it continue.
Fine Gael and their allies in the press defame Connolly because they have nothing to offer. No policies worth discussing. No vision worth expounding. Just pablum about representing everyone and bringing people together.
The public can distinguish between someone who has opposed power and someone who wielded it to inflict austerity. Despite weeks of smears, Connolly maintains a commanding lead in the polls. The establishment knows it's losing and can’t win on merit. Yates just acknowledged what everyone already knew.
