General Election: McConalogue grateful for support after ‘personalised attacks’ 

Charlie McConalogue has welcomed the election of two Fianna Fáil TDs in the Donegal constituency as a “good result” for the county.

The outgoing TD and agriculture minister in the last government was elected in the Donegal constituency on the 16th count along with 100% Redress candidate Charlie Ward.

The Inishowen-based candidate endured a close race with sitting Independent TD Thomas Pringle who lost his seat after 13 years in the Dáil. 

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McConalogue’s share of the first preferences increased by 2% to 12.8% compared to the 2020 general election as he was elected along with party colleague Pat ‘the Cope’ Gallager who is returning to the Dáil after losing his seat in 2020.

“It was quite close but we knew it would be close from the outset, but I’m very thankful to the public for their support in the election for coming out to vote for me and glad for the support for the party, coming back with two seats,” he said.

“While two seats is a really good result for Fiann Fáil here in Donegal, I think it is a  really good result for Donegal too, because the alternative of four opposition TDs and one government TD would have left our county in a  much weaker position in terms of influencing government and punching our weight at national level over the next five years.”

After coming under pressure over the defective concrete blocks crisis and bearing the brunt of discontent at the government’s redress scheme, he said the election campaign had featured “a lot of personalised attacks which I had never seen before in any campaign, coming directly at myself”.

“Rather than a call to vote for others, it was a call for people not to vote for me, and different things that went with that too,” he said. 

“That had an impact and certainly that ramped up over the last week of the campaign. The online stuff now does have an influence on elections and certainly the online content we have seen in the last week really did cut through as well and put pressure on and against that backdrop. So I was very grateful to be able to hold my vote share from the previous time.”