The campaign for the local and European elections saw dozens of incidents of political intimidation and harassment, with women and immigrant candidates suffering the brunt of abuse.
The campaign was marked by high levels of vitriol, including incidents of assault, stalking and harassment, according to research by two anti-extremist groups.
“It’s unprecedented. We haven’t these levels of vitriol and anger before. It’s affecting minority candidates but also well-established parties,” said Aoife Gallagher of the Institute of Strategic Dialogue (ISD) which carried out the research alongside the Hope and Courage Collective. “Things have definitely got worse.”
Researchers tracked 36 instances of “politically motivated violence, intimidation, harassment or threats” since campaigning for the local and European elections began on May 6th. They warned this is likely to be a significant undercount as many incidents were not publicly reported.
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Instances include harassment and racial abuse of candidates, both online and on the streets, and alleged criminal acts including assault and stalking. Several Garda investigations are ongoing into election-related offences which occurred over the past month.
These include the assault of independent councillor Tania Doyle and her husband in west Dublin last month as they were putting up posters. A man attacked the couple after aggressively demanding to know Ms Doyle’s views on immigration.
On the same day, Green Party local election candidate Janet Horner was attacked while hanging up posters in north inner city Dublin. She said an irate man threw her posters across the road and lunged at her when she tried to stop him.
Candidates from across the political spectrum were targeted, including Philip Dwyer, who is running for the Ireland First party, and Malachy Steenson, an Independent candidate for Europe running in Dublin on an anti-immigration platform.
However, researchers said “the majority of those taking part in such actions are influenced by far-right rhetoric”. This trend mirrors an increase in far-right political violence across the European Union, the report states.
Record numbers of women and candidates with a migrant background ran in the elections and these candidates also suffered a disproportionate level of abuse.
“Of the 36 incidents, 21 targeted women and 15 targeted men. In 13 of the incidents, individuals from a migrant background who are running for election were targeted, with all of these cases featuring racially-charged abuse,” the report states.
Fine Gael’s director of elections TD Damien English said this week nearly all of the 16 minority candidates running for the party had experienced threats and racist abuse during the campaign.
This includes Sarah Adedeji, a 23-year-old trainee pharmacist running for a South Dublin council seat in Clondalkin, where she was born. Last month a far-right activist filmed and aggressively confronted Ms Adedeji, who is black, as she hung posters.
“All these traitors will be arrested and publicly executed for treason against the Irish people,” the man filming her later posted online.
Nine incidents were directed at Fine Gael candidates, researchers found. Independents were targeted eight times and Green Party and Sinn Féin candidates were targeted on five occasions each. In seven incidents, candidates were confronted specifically about immigration.
“Common themes that emerged from those involved in the intimidation and harassment included referring to members of established political parties as ‘traitors’ and issuing sinister threats to candidates,” the report states.
ISD describes itself as an “independent, non-profit organisation” dedicated to “reversing the rising tide of polarisation, extremism and disinformation worldwide.” The Hope and Courage Collective describes itself as “a leading civil-society group in Ireland countering hate and disinformation”.
