Gary Gannon

Gary Gannon (born 18 February 1987) is an Irish Social Democrats politician who has served as a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Dublin Central constituency since the 2020 general election and the Social Democrats Spokesperson for Justice, Migration and Home Affairs since the 2024 General Election.

He served as a Dublin City Councillor for the North Inner City constituency from 2014 to 2020.

Background Gannon was born in Dublin's North Inner City, raised in Portland Place and now lives in Glasnevin. The son of a street trader, he left school to train as a plumber. He later studied history and politics at Trinity College Dublin.

In a 2026 interview, Gannon said he was born in the Mountain View Court flats in Summerhill and lived there until around the age of seven, when his family moved to nearby Sean O'Casey Avenue. His mother worked as a street trader on Henry Street, while his father took part in the Concerned Parents Against Drugs movement, at times sleeping in makeshift huts erected to confront drug dealers operating in the area.

Political career Councillor Gannon was involved with Tony Gregory's political group and canvassed for Maureen O'Sullivan at the 2011 general election, before deciding to run against them in 2014 amidst a row over candidate selection.

In September 2015, he joined the newly formed Social Democrats, having also held discussions with Sinn Féin and People Before Profit before deciding the Social Democrats had the politics closest to his own. He ran in the Dublin Central constituency, losing out narrowly on a seat to Maureen O'Sullivan.

In May 2019, Gannon contested the 2019 European Parliament elections in the Dublin constituency. He was not elected. On the same day he was elected to Dublin City Council for the Cabra-Glasnevin local electoral area.

As a TD 2020 to 2024 Gannon again stood as the Social Democrats candidate in the Dublin Central constituency at the 2020 general election and won a seat on the 9th count.

As a TD Gannon has spoken on issues relating to access to education, and on how the lack of access to education can play into poverty and gang violence. He has also spoken about the Magdalene laundries and the need to preserve the historical significance of the sites.

In May 2021 Gannon called upon Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney to expel the Israeli Ambassador to Ireland following the outbreak of the 2021 Israel–Palestine crisis.

In August 2021, following the Katherine Zappone controversy, Gannon wrote to the chair of the Oireachtas Foreign Affairs Committee Charles Flanagan to demand that the committee investigate Zappone's appointment as a special envoy to the UN.

In November 2021 Gannon introduced a Bill to the Dáil which sought to "ensure that every single student and school that receives State funding will receive the same fact-based health, relationship and sex education regardless of their school's ethos", rather than sex education being dictated by religious values. Minister for Education Norma Foley did not oppose the Bill but called for a nine-month delay on its introduction in order to give time to schools to update their curriculums.

In June 2022, Gannon was ordered to repay over €1,000 in expenses after recording the lowest attendance of any TD in the Dáil in 2021. TDs must attend a minimum of 120 days to avail of the Oireachtas travel and accommodation allowance, with Gannon having attended 109 days.

In November 2022, following protests against the housing of international protection applicants in a former ESB building in East Wall, Gannon said fringe elements of the far right were "whipping up hysteria" in the area, and that anger over the housing and cost-of-living crisis was being misplaced. He said the north inner-city community had not been properly informed about the change of use of the building, and that the State's failure to communicate with residents had allowed "more nefarious movements" to fill the gap. He described eventual party leader Holly Cairns as a "generational politician". Gannon described those involved in the riot as "absolute thugs" who had been "operating in the city centre of Dublin over the last two years" without consequence, and said the events should not be described as protest. While praising the gardaí who worked during the riot as "absolute heroes", he criticised the delay in deploying additional gardaí to the city centre as a "failure of operational intelligence".

In May 2025, following renewed anti-immigration protests in Dublin 8 over a building on Basin Lane earmarked for use as international protection accommodation, Gannon wrote that fear, rather than hatred, was driving protests in working-class communities that felt neglected by the State. He said such communities had long been "waiting" for housing, school places and regeneration while seeing investment directed into hotels and commercial development nearby, and warned that unaddressed fear left communities vulnerable to being exploited by the far right. In a draft affidavit, Gannon said investors in and sellers of Israeli bonds risked being "complicit in genocide". He called on Garda Commissioner Justin Kelly and Minister for Justice Jim O'Callaghan to address the shortage, describing the reduction in capacity as "short sighted" and warning it left both gardaí and the communities they served vulnerable.

Amid a week of fuel protests in April 2026 prompted by the cost-of-living crisis, Gannon wrote that the government was "out of touch, out of answers and out of time", criticising ministers for curtailing Dáil business on their return from the Easter recess. He criticised Minister for Justice Jim O'Callaghan's warning that the Army could be deployed, and Minister for Communities, Media and Sport Patrick O'Donovan's suggestion that media coverage of the protests be reviewed. He said arson attacks linked to drug debt had quadrupled in four years and that poverty was "the one consistent factor" in the grooming of children into criminality. Gannon said the result showed people in the constituency had "bought into" the party's authenticity, and that the Social Democrats would not "compromise" on their values in any future coalition. Gannon said the changes had caused the criminal legal aid and court system to "grind to a halt", leading to delays with serious implications for victims of crime, and called on the minister to resume engagement with the Law Society. while supporting a version that incorporates continuous assessment. Gannon supports the scrapping of Student Contributions to Universities in favour of a system of covering third level education costs through taxation.

It was also in August 2021 that Gannon stated he supports harsher sanctions by the European Union on Belarus in order to pressure Alexander Lukashenko, whom Gannon labelled a "tyrant". Gannon has spoken in support of political prisoners jailed under Lukashenko.

Gannon has advocated for reclassifying drug use as a public health issue rather than primarily a policing matter. As Cathaoirleach of the Joint Committee on Drugs Use, he opposed retaining Section 3 of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1977, arguing it functions as a "class power" that is disproportionately enforced in disadvantaged areas rather than in "a more privileged setting like a rugby club". He said he had also experienced depression and had attended counselling, and described being "near the point of burnout" by the time he was elected to the Dáil in 2020. Gannon said he was fortunate to have been able to access private healthcare in order to obtain his diagnosis, and expressed frustration that not everyone in Ireland could do the same.

Gannon's older brother, Brian, played football for Shelbourne, and his younger twin brothers, Alan and Paul, also played to a high level; Gannon himself played for Sheriff Youth Club.

Gannon has acknowledged that he previously used illegal drugs recreationally, stating that he had taken cocaine and MDMA after leaving school and while attending Trinity College Dublin. He said he chose to speak openly about his past at the beginning of the Oireachtas drugs committee's work because he believed it was important to recognise drug use as a reality experienced by many people, rather than deny it. At the same time, Gannon stressed that he did not want his comments to be seen as normalising or glamorising drug use. He said he considered himself fortunate not to have developed an addiction or become involved in criminality, contrasting his own experience with that of others from his childhood community, where drug use was often linked to trauma rather than recreation. He argued that many people use drugs recreationally, but that in disadvantaged communities drug use is frequently rooted in deeper social and personal problems.

Election results Elections to the DáilPartyElection Result Dublin Central 2016 2,307 9.7 Eliminated on count 11/11 Dublin Central 2020 2,912 9.3 Elected on count 9/9 Dublin Central 2024 4,353 13.3 Elected on count 8/11 Elections to Dublin City CouncilPartyElection Result North Inner City 2014 7.2 741 Elected on count 13/13 Cabra–Glasnevin 2019 10.3 1,662 Elected on count 9/15