Jonah Craig and Dominic McGrath are the first elected officers in the Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) sabbatical officer elections.
Craig was elected as Entertainment Officer with 82.1% of the vote. Craig received 2,500 first preference votes, with the option to Re-Open Nominations (RON) receiving 446 votes.
Both races for Ents and University Times Editor were uncontested, with McGrath being the only candidate for Editor for the third year in a row. Turnout for the elections was 17.2%, with 3,120 students voting.
Speaking before the result was announced, Craig said: “I’m a little nervous but looking forward to getting through with the evening. The main thing is, it’s the last step of the campaign, I’ve been with a lot of the other people running and it’s just mainly with them, because it’s going to be close for a lot of the other races so I’m looking forward to it, just a little nervous.”
Meanwhile, McGrath was elected with 2,526 votes, representing 86.8% of the vote. RON received 383 votes, with 144 votes invalid. Speaking to Trinity News before being elected, McGrath said: “I’m very excited, it’s always good to be at the count. I think my vote is going to be the first called so I’m very excited, a little bit nervous, but we’ll see how it goes!”
In polls before the election, Trinity News predicted that both Craig and McGrath would be elected with 85.3% and 86.3% of the vote respectively.
Additional reporting by Oisín Vince Coulter, Aisling Grace, Johnny Byrne, Cathal Kavanagh, Oisin Daly, Dáire O’Driscoll and Niamh Moriarty.