Sixteen individuals have been officially nominated to compete in the upcoming University of Dublin Seanad election.
Ballots will be sent to registered voters starting 30th December 2024, with voting closing at 11 am on 29th January 2025.
This marks the final occasion where the University of Dublin constituency will elect three Senators to the Seanad. Beginning in 2026, graduates from Trinity College and the National University of Ireland (NUI) will jointly elect six Senators under the Higher Education constituency.
The current Senators representing the University of Dublin are Tom Clonan and Lynn Ruane, while David Norris retired in January 2024.
More than 76,000 graduates of the University of Dublin are registered to participate in this election.
Candidates include Green Party Councillor Hazel Chu, who is just coming off a defeat in the recent general election in the Dublin Bay South constituency, wherein she came seventh in a four-seater constituency and failed to hold the Dáil seat of her outgoing party leader, Eamon Ryan.
Also featuring on the ballot is American-born dual citizen Independent Katherine Zappone, who between 2016 and 2020 served as Minister for Children and Youth Affairs under the then-Fine Gael government, until she lost her Dáil seat in 2020, coming sixth in the five seater constituency of Dublin South-West.
First-time candidate Laoise De Brún is also running – a feminist activist with the campaigning group The Countess, which primarily focuses on pushing back on the influence of transgender ideology on women’s rights and women’s spaces.
The full list of candidates for the Seanad election 2025 is as follows:
1. ABBAS ALI O’SHEA
2. DEREK BYRNE
3. KEVIN BYRNE
4. HAZEL CHU
5. TOM CLONAN
6. LAOISE DE BRÚN
7. HUGO MACNEILL
8. MARCUS MATTHEWS
9. AUBREY MCCARTHY
10. JOHN (JACK) MULCAHY
11. PAUL MULVILLE
12. ADE OLUBORODE
13. SADHBH O’NEILL
14. LYNN RUANE
15. OSSIAN SMYTH
16. KATHERINE ZAPPONE
