World
Ireland votes in a close-run election where incumbents hope to cling on to power
Ireland is voting Friday in a parliamentary election that will decide the next government — and will show whether Ireland bucks the global trend of incumbents being ousted by disgruntled voters after years of pandemic, international instability and cost-of-living pressures.
Polls opened at 7 a.m.. (0700GMT), and Ireland’s 3.8 million voters are selecting 174 lawmakers to sit in the Dail, the lower house of parliament.
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Here’s a look at the parties, the issues and the likely outcome.
Who’s running?
The outgoing government was led by the two parties who have dominated Irish politics for the past century: Fine Gael and Fianna Fail. They have similar center-right policies but are longtime rivals with origins on opposing sides of Ireland’s 1920s civil war.
After the 2020 election ended in a virtual dead heat they formed a coalition, agreeing to share Cabinet posts and take turns as taoiseach, or prime minister. Fianna Fail leader Micheál Martin served as premier for the first half of the term and was replaced by Fine Gael’s Leo Varadkar in December 2022. Varadkar unexpectedly stepped down in March, passing the job to current Taoiseach Simon Harris.
Opposition party Sinn Fein achieved a stunning breakthrough in the 2020 election, topping the popular vote, but was shut out of government because Fianna Fail and Fine Gael refused to work with it, citing its leftist policies and historic ties with militant group the Irish Republican Army during three decades of violence in Northern Ireland.
Under Ireland’s system of proportional representation, each of the 43 constituencies elects multiple lawmakers, with voters ranking their preferences. That makes it relatively easy for smaller parties and independent candidates with a strong local following to gain seats.
Presiding officer Caroline Sharkey and Garda Ronan Steede look after a ballot box that is taken by boat to the Island of Gola as voters go to polls the for the 2024 General Election in Ireland, Friday, Nov. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Peter Morrison)
This election includes a large crop of independent candidates, ranging from local campaigners to far-right activists and reputed crime boss Gerry “the Monk” Hutch.
What are the main issues?
As in many other countries, the cost of living — especially housing — has dominated the campaign. Ireland has an acute housing shortage, the legacy of failing to build enough new homes during the country’s “Celtic Tiger” boom years and the economic slump that followed the 2008 global financial crisis.
“There was not building during the crisis, and when the crisis receded, offices and hotels were built first,” said John-Mark McCafferty, chief executive of housing and homelessness charity Threshold.
The result is soaring house prices, rising rents and growing homelessness.
After a decade of economic growth, McCafferty said “Ireland has resources” — not least 13 billion euros ($13.6 billion) in back taxes the European Union has ordered Apple to pay it — “but it is trying to address big historic infrastructural deficits.”
Tangled up with the housing issue is immigration, a fairly recent challenge to a country long defined by emigration. Recent arrivals include more than 100,000 Ukrainians displaced by war and thousands of people fleeing poverty and conflict in the Middle East and Africa.
This country of 5.4 million has struggled to house all the asylum-seekers, leading to tent camps and makeshift accommodation centers that have attracted tension and protests. A stabbing attack on children outside a Dublin school a year ago, in which an Algerian man has been charged, sparked the worst rioting Ireland had seen in decades.
Unlike many European countries, Ireland does not have a significant far-right party, but far-right voices on social media seek to drum up hostility to migrants, and anti-immigrant independent candidates are hoping for election in several districts. The issue appears to be hitting support for Sinn Fein, as working-class supporters bristled at its pro-immigration policies.
What’s the likely outcome?
Opinion polls suggest voters’ support is split into five roughly even chunks — for Fine Gael, Fianna Fail, Sinn Fein, several smaller parties and an assortment of independents.
Fine Gael has run a gaffe-prone campaign, Fianna Fail has remained steady in the polls and Sinn Fein says it has momentum, but is unlikely to win power unless the other parties drop their opposition to working with it.
Analysts say the most likely outcome is another Fine Gael-Fianna Fail coalition, possibly with a smaller party or a clutch of independents as kingmakers.
“It’s just a question of which minor group is going to be the group that supports the government this time,” said Eoin O’Malley, a political scientist at Dublin City University. “Coalition-forming is about putting a hue on what is essentially the same middle-of-the-road government every time.”
When will we know the results?
Polls close Friday at 10 p.m. (2200GMT), when an exit poll will give the first hints about the result. Counting ballots begins on Saturday morning. Full results could take several days, and forming a government days or weeks after that.
Harris, who cast his vote in Delgany, south of Dublin, said Irish voters and politicians have “got a long few days ahead of us.”
“Isn’t it the beauty and the complexity of our system that when the clock strikes 10 o’clock tonight, there’ll be an exit poll but that won’t even tell us the outcome of the election,” he said.
A court of appeal in Kenya on Friday struck down a ruling that had affirmed the right to an abortion, dealing a blow to reproductive rights in a country where thousands of women die each year from unsafe abortions.
The decision, which is likely to be appealed to Kenya’s supreme court, holds that abortions deprive unborn children of the “right to life,” which it said begins at conception. “Abortion is not a fundamental right guaranteed under the Constitution,” the judges wrote in their ruling.
The decision overturned a 2022 ruling, which focused on a teenager who had received emergency medical care after an abortion in 2019. The court ruled then that the arrests of the teenager and her doctor were unconstitutional.
Those criminal proceedings were reinstated by the appeal court’s Friday decision, which said that lower courts had to investigate whether the treatment carried out was indeed a medical emergency.
The Center for Reproductive Rights, a New York-based rights group, called the ruling “deeply disappointing” and a “setback” for reproductive rights in the country, and said it would challenge it in the supreme court.
As part of the overturned 2022 decision, judges instructed Kenya’s Parliament to pass a law protecting access to abortion and clarifying how the country’s 2010 Constitution allows the treatment. The Constitution holds that abortion is prohibited in Kenya, unless a doctor deems it medically necessary or if another statute expands access (for example, allowing abortion in cases like rape).
Judges cited that article of the Constitution in their ruling on Friday in arguing for a narrower interpretation. They wrote that abortion is not an “absolute right,” and that the Constitution is designed to prohibit it except for “limited circumstances when it may be permissible.”
In practice, Kenya’s penal code had not been updated to reflect the 2022 ruling, which sought to make abortions easier to get. A 1963 law continues to criminalize abortion in Kenya, a measure that rights groups say is often used to intimidate women from seeking reproductive care and medical professionals from providing abortions.
“This case forms part of a broader pattern in which individuals seeking or providing reproductive health care face criminal sanction, despite constitutional guarantees of dignity, health, and freedom from cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment,” the Center for Reproductive Rights said in a statement.
Every year, at least 2,600 women die from unsafe abortions in Kenya, and 21,000 more are hospitalized because of abortion complications, according to the group. A 2023 study by the African Population and Health Research Center found that over 300,000 women in Kenya had to seek care for post-abortion complications.
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On Saturday, Gazans in Deir al-Balah will go to the polls to elect new local leaders for the first time in 2o years, a move experts warn could allow Hamas room to maintain influence as it refuses to comply with ceasefire disarmament terms.
The Foundation for Defense of Democracies Executive Director Jonathan Schanzer told Fox News Digital that “when you hold elections in the Palestinian Authority and the timing’s not right and the circumstances are still dicey, you get Hamas victories.”
Schanzer said the Bush administration’s 2006 decision to advocate for elections “led to Hamas winning, and it led to a standoff which led to a civil war.”
“You’ve got to be really careful when it comes to holding elections with a territory like Gaza in particular, where Hamas has so much control, and where terrorist organizations are still considered to be legitimate players,” Schanzer added.
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Gazan journalists and media personnel continue to be posthumously identified as members of terrorist groups, highlighting the difficulty of distinguishing terror affiliates from civilians.
Election campaign banners showing candidates for the upcoming municipal elections hang on a building in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip April 21, 2026. (Eyad Baba/AFP via Getty Images)
Four parties are contesting the election in Deir al-Balah. To be eligible, candidates were asked to accept the Palestine Liberation Organization and the terms of agreements it has previously made, including recognition of the State of Israel and endorsement of a two-state solution, according to reporting by the Center for Peace Communications.
However, many are concerned that one party, Deir al-Balah Unites Us, is affiliated with Hamas. Two of its candidates have been pictured with Hamas officials or police officers.
Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib, resident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, posted on X that “holding elections in Gaza at this time is extremely reckless and irresponsible,” noting that “Gazans are being arrested, jailed, tortured, shot, and killed daily for social media posts and anything they say that’s perceived as being critical of Hamas.
“These elections should be halted and prevented from proceeding, for they are meddling with the transition process that the Board of Peace, [National Council for the Administration of Gaza], and the international community have planned for Gaza, with Hamas’s disarmament and relinquishment of power being the first necessary step.”
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Disarmament of Hamas, a key demand within the second phase of President Donald Trump’s ceasefire agreement, has yet to be completed. Reports indicate that Hamas has increased its hold in Gaza as of March, continuing to tax locals, building education system and placing police throughout the territory it holds.
Hamas terrorists stand guard in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip Feb. 22, 2025, during the handover of hostages as part of a ceasefire and hostage-prisoner swap deal with Israel. (Hatem Khaled/Reuters)
Schanzer said Hamas is unlikely to hand over its arms. If it were to do so, he said that they “will try to make distinctions between weapons,” possibly offering to give up heavy weapons like RPGs while maintaining a large arsenal of automatic weapons.
Hamas appears to have made a partial disarmament offer. The New York Times reported April 19 that two Hamas officials said they would hand over thousands of weapons from their police force and other security institutions. The officials “did not provide a clear answer” when asked if weapons from Hamas’ so-called military wing would be included.
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President Donald Trump holds up a signed agreement during a world leaders summit focused on ending the Gaza war in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, on Oct. 13. (Suzanne Plunkett/Getty Images)
Schanzer pushed back on claims that Hamas’ political and military wings operate separately.
“That is a fiction. The idea that they are separate in any way or that there is a firewall between them is asinine.” He said that this is “a distinction that has been made up by the West in order to be able to have political relations with Hamas, or to justify elections. It’s a mistake to buy into that fiction.”
Schanzer said weakening Iran could be key to minimizing Hamas’ influence.
“The psychological impact of their top patron being defeated on the battlefield, I can’t overstate how important that event could be,” he said. “It would be a gut punch to Hamas.”
An election campaign starts in the city of Deir al-Balah, Gaza on April 12, 2026, as part of the local elections scheduled for April 25. (Mohammed Eslayeh/Anadolu via Getty Images)
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With Israel controlling about 53% of the Gaza Strip and Hamas the remaining 47%, Schanzer said, “We could continue to see the erosion of Hamas control” amid the “slow and steady process of Israel winning on the ground.”
He said patience, though, is necessary, adding that “the enemies of the United States and Israel and the West have a very different timeline. They want to wait out everybody because they know that we’d like to move on.”
The Trump administration did not respond to Fox News Digital’s questions about whether a partial disarmament would satisfy its ceasefire terms or if it would take action to stall elections until there’s more stability in Gaza
Anticorruption police gathered material from the homes of election officials including former office leader Piero Corvetto.
Published On 24 Apr 2026
Police in the Peruvian capital of Lima have raided a home belonging to the former head of its national election agency, amid growing frustration in the aftermath of the country’s presidential election.
As of Friday, results still had not been finalised for the presidential race, which took place on April 12.
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Delays in ballot deliveries forced the voting in some areas to be extended by an extra day, and the slow vote count has led to accusations of wrongdoing. But the European Union’s election mission to Peru found no indication of fraud.
Law enforcement was seen entering the home of Piero Corvetto, the former head of Peru’s National Office of Electoral Processes (ONPE), on Friday as part of a judicial warrant.
The officers with the local anticorruption police unit were tasked with removing mobile phones, laptops and documents, according to local broadcaster RPP.
The homes of five other officials were also targeted by police raids, as were offices belonging to Galaga, a private company that transports election ballots.
Corvetto resigned on Tuesday, though he denied any wrongdoing or irregularities in the election process. In a statement, he said he hoped his departure would boost public confidence.
On Friday, his lawyer, Ricardo Sanchez Carranza, told the news agency Reuters that a judge authorised the raid but denied prosecutors’ request to put Corvetto in preliminary detention.
But one of the leading presidential candidates, Lima’s former far-right mayor, Rafael Lopez Aliaga, has accused Corvetto of being a “criminal” and pledging to pursue him “until he dies”.
Lopez Aliaga is currently in a narrow race for second place in the presidential election.
With 95 percent of the ballots tallied, right-wing candidate and former First Lady Keiko Fujimori is in first place with 17 percent of the vote. She is all but assured of proceeding to the run-off on June 7.
Lopez Aliaga, meanwhile, is in third place with 11.9 percent, behind left-wing Congress member Roberto Sanchez at 12.03 percent.
Roughly 20,000 votes separate Sanchez from Lopez Aliaga, who has increasingly denounced the election as illegitimate, though he has yet to provide evidence to support that claim. Still, he has called the vote tally an “electoral fraud unique in the world”.
The final results are expected on May 15.
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