MEP Pat The Cope Gallagher says he believes he’s still in with a shout of landing the fourth seat in the 4-seat Midlands North West constituency today.
The Donegal Fianna Fail politician goes into second day of the count in Castlebar knowing that he would probably have been elected by now if party HQ hadn’t added Thomas Byrne to the ticket.
But all that is being set aside for now as Gallagher goes into an expected fourth seat cliffhanger with Marian Harkin.
“It’s still all to play for,” The Cope told Donegal Daily this morning.
“There are still tens of thousands of votes in play and until they are all counted and the last transfers are made, we won’t be sure.
“But I’m verging on the side of optimism at the moment.”
Gallagher has won 14 election battles in a row – and this – his 15th looks set to be his biggest one yet.
The count resumes later today with the transfer of Senator Ronan Mullen’s 41,164 votes after his elimination last night.
Luke Flanagan has already reached the quota and has been elected. Sinn Fein’s Matt Carthy – who got a huge Donegal vote – will be elected next with Mairead McGuinness of Fine Gael expected to take the third seat.
If Gallagher can stay ahead of Byrne before his elimination, he should get enough transfers to get past the line – but Harkin is 15,000 votes ahead at this stage. Every transfer will count.
Flanagan, Luke “Ming” (Ind) 124063 129561 (elected)
Carthy, Matt (SF) 114727 117670 120723
McGuinness, Mairead (FG) 92080 94019 102025
Harkin, Marian (Ind) 68986 72045 77798
Gallagher, Pat The Cope (FF) 59562 60466 62071
Byrne, Thomas (FF) 55384 56528 58505
Higgins, Jim (FG) 39908 40462 43292
Mullen, Rónán (Ind) 36326 38260 41164 (eliminated)
Higgins, Lorraine (Lab) 31951 33744 (eliminated)
Dearey, Mark (GP) 9520 (eliminated)
Gilroy, Ben (DDI) 7683 (eliminated)
Fitzsimons, Mark (Ind) 2424 (eliminated)
Fay, TJ (Ind) 2002 (eliminated)
Nic Fhearraigh, Cordelia (FN) 1829 (eliminated)
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