Mary Lou Mcdonald Biography
Irish politician Mary Louise McDonald was born on May 1, 1969. She has been president of Sinn Féin since February 2018 and has led the opposition in Ireland since June 2020. Since 2011, she has served as a Teachta Dála (TD) for Dublin Central. She was a member of the European Parliament (MEP) for the Dublin constituency from 2004 to 2009, as well as the vice president of Sinn Féin from 2009 to 2018.
Following a special ardfheis (party congress) in Dublin, McDonald succeeded longstanding party leader Gerry Adams as president of Sinn Féin on February 10, 2018. For the first time in almost a century, neither Fine Gael nor Fianna Fáil received the most votes in the 2020 general election, thanks to a notable improvement in Sinn Féin’s result. With 37 seats, Sinn Féin came in second place, one less than Fianna Fáil’s 38 seats.
After Fianna Fáil, the Green Party, and Fine Gael formed a government and Michael Martin was appointed Taoiseach in June 2020, McDonald was named Leader of the Opposition. Since Thomas Johnson of the Labour Party took office in 1927, she is the first woman to hold that role and the first to come from a party other than Fianna Fáil or Fine Gael.
Mary Lou Mcdonald’s Net Worth
Mary’s net worth is estimated to be around $18.1 MILLION as of updated 2022.
Mary McDonald Salary
The leader of Sinn Fein, Mary Lou McDonald, has been open about how much money she earns while serving in the Dáil.
She has been dodging questions regarding how much of her €94,500 salary she receives, though, in recent weeks.
She has since disclosed that, after taxes, she makes around €24,000 a year, with the remaining money going toward paying the overhead expenses of her two constituency offices.
Mary Lou Mcdonald’s Early life and education
Her parents, Patrick McDonald, a builder and surveyor, and Joan, a housewife, were middle-class[4] when she was born in south Dublin. When she was nine years old, their marriage ended, and she moved home with her mother in Rathgar. She has two younger siblings and one older sister. In the late 2000s, her sister Joanne, a teacher, was active in the socialist republican party Éirígí.
During the Irish Civil War, McDonald’s great-uncle James O’Connor, an Anti-Treaty IRA member, was put to death at the Curragh Camp. He faced the death penalty at the time of his charges for unlawfully possessing guns. At the time, O’Connor was 24 years old. McDonald stated in January 2023 that she was still “learning curve” in the ins and outs of transgender difficulties and that one of her siblings had changed from male to female in 2021.
McDonald attended Notre Dame Des Missions, an all-girls Catholic school in Churchtown, South Dublin, where she participated in debating.
McDonald continued her education after school at Trinity College Dublin, where she graduated with a bachelor’s degree in English literature. She subsequently attended Dublin City University to study industrial relations, and in 1995, she graduated with a Master of Arts in European Integration Studies from the University of Limerick. She had positions as a trainer in the Partnership Unit of the Educational and Training Services Trust, a researcher for the Institute of European Affairs, a consultant for the Irish Productivity Centre (a human resources consultancy run in tandem by Ibec and ICTU), and a consultant for the Irish Productivity Centre.
McDonald joined the cross-party republican Irish National Congress and rose to the position of chairperson in 2000. He spearheaded a protest in Dublin against the Lord Mayor’s involvement in the unveiling of a plaque at the site of the Grand Orange Lodge of Ireland’s 1798 founding meeting.
Mary Lou Mcdonald Career
McDonald joined Fianna Fáil in 1998 to start her political career, but after a year she left the party due to fundamental policy differences, particularly in regards to Northern Ireland and social justice.
McDonald responded, “I was in the wrong party,” when asked about her tenure in Fianna Fáil in 2014. McDonald discovered that Sinn Féin more accurately reflected her Republican values after getting to know some of its members through the Irish National Congress.
Gerry Adams announced that he would not be standing for re-election as a TD for the Louth constituency in the upcoming election after being re-elected as Sinn Féin leader on November 18, 2017, and that he would instead ask the party leadership to call for a special Ard Fheis to be held within three months to elect a new president.
After the deadline for nominations to succeed Adams passed on January 20, 2018, McDonald was named the new president of Sinn Féin because no other contenders had entered the race.
She was formally elected president on February 10, 2018, at a special Ard Fheis held in Dublin.
Mary Lou Mcdonald’s Public Image
Since taking office, McDonald has been credited with contributing to the new wave of Sinn Féin members who have expanded the party’s outreach and boosted its vote. Writing on McDonald and the 2004 election success for Sinn Féin (using the subheading “Shopaholic Trinity girl is the face of new Sinn Fein”), The Times described McDonald as “more Brown Thomas beret than balaclava” and “part of a new generation of Sinn Féiners” after she became the party’s first MEP in 2004 (receiving more than triple the percentage of votes the party had received five years earlier).
The article went on to say that “in Donaghmede, another Trinity graduate was chosen, and among the party candidates in Dublin were a philosophy student and someone going by the unusual name of Pembroke, who happens to be a Republican. The irony is that middle-aged Sinn Fein men who saw ‘action’ in the 1980s or who did time in prison are no more successful at snatching up working-class voters than the smoked-salmon socialists. McDonald attracted votes and transfers from both ghettos and wealthy areas, fully embracing the Sinn Fein base.”
McDonald’s popularity and leadership qualities have been acknowledged. It’s a cliché to say that Mary Lou McDonald is a mystery, but it’s real, according to Kathy Sheridan of The Irish Times. affable, kind, and personable yet never fully coming out as herself. a blunt speaker who seems to speak from the hip but refrains from making unconsidered statements.
Sheridan additionally stated that she was “the embodiment of educated, Dublin 6 middle-class privilege who peddles a persuasive anti-establishment line and attracts the kind of adoring scrums last seen in Bertie Ahern’s heyday.” Sheridan summarized her accomplishments as bringing Sinn Féin into the political mainstream in Ireland.” Under her direction, Sinn Féin was the most popular party according to opinion polls as of November 2021.
The way McDonald has handled claims of bullying and other abuses within Sinn Féin is cited by some who are skeptical of her public persona. Her response to the Máiría Cahill controversy of the 2010s, in which Cahill claimed that members of the Provisional IRA had sexually molested her while she was a teenager and that Sinn Féin members had later concealed this information, was met with criticism. Journalist Jennifer Bray accused McDonald of portraying herself and her leadership “in a very unflattering light” in her 2022 handling of Violet-Anne Wynne’s claims of bullying within the party. McDonald’s has also been under fire.
Since 2015, McDonald has had to keep her distance from former Sinn Féin councilor Jonathan Dowdall, who entered a guilty plea in 2022 for the murder of David Byrne after being found guilty of kidnapping and torturing a man in 2018. In 2014, Dowdall was elected as a Sinn Féin councilor in McDonald’s seat. The Guardian has called Dowdall a McDonald “protege” throughout his one-year term in office. The Guardian continued by saying that McDonald’s reputation had been “tainted” by the Dowdall connection.
Mary Lou Mcdonald’s Personal Life
The pair has two kids, and McDonald’s spouse, Martin Lanigan, is employed by state infrastructure provider Gas Networks Ireland as a gas control supervisor for the emergency dispatch unit. Dublin’s Cabra is her home. She studied transcendental meditation “…to build resilience and to maintain my composure and sense of grounding.”
Mary Lou Mcdonald Health
McDonald suffers from asthma. She said in April 2020 that, as a result of a test she received on March 28, 2020, she had tested positive for COVID-19. She declared in a statement that she was well again, but that she now had pleurisy in her right lung. She said that she had been informed by the public health physician that she was no longer contagious or sick. McDonald disclosed in 2023 that she had had a hysterectomy, removing her womb and ovaries. She made a full recovery and quickly resumed her political career.
Mary Lou Mcdonald’s Father
Patrick McDonald was a South Dublin-based builder and surveyor, he is Mary McDonald’s father.
Mary Lou Mcdonald Family And Siblings
Her younger twin siblings, Patrick and Joanne, as well as her older brother Bernard make up her family. In the late aughts, her sister Joanne, a teacher, joined the socialist republican Éirg party.
Brother Bernard is a researcher, while Brother Patrick practices intellectual property law. During the Irish Civil War, McDonald’s great-uncle James O’Connor, a member of the Anti-Treaty IRA, was shot in the Curragh Camp.
He was detained for possessing a firearm, a crime that at the time was capital. O’Connor was 24 years old at the time.
FAQS
Where is Mary Lou McDonald from?
She is from Churchtown, Ireland.
What is Mary Lou McDonald’s profession?
She is a politician.
Who is Mary McDonald’s husband?
Her husband is Martin Latigan.
Is Mary Lou McDonald married?
Yes, she is Married to Martin Latigan.
When was Mary Lou McDonald born?
Irish politician Mary Louise McDonald was born on May 1, 1969. She has been president of Sinn Féin since February 2018 and has led the opposition in Ireland since June 2020. Since 2011, she has served as a Teachta Dála (TD) for Dublin Central.
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