Sean Defoe

All right, and you'll be coming back to us later on in the programme with more detailed tallies, I suppose, more accurate tallies.

Sean Defoe, Newstalk's political correspondent.

Yes, good morning and welcome.

There's a smell of elections in the air this May 23rd.

Sean Defoe here with you for the next hour with this News Talk election special.

Ballot boxes have just opened in Dublin and Galway.

Thousands of votes spilling out onto the counting tables and hidden in those piles the fates of the 31 candidates battling to be Ireland's next TDs.

In Dublin Central, whether it's the streets of the North Inner City, out to Marylew Country in Canberra, the leafy suburbs of Glasnevin,

or down to the Three Arena in Dublin Port.

14 hopefuls battling it out to replace Pascal Donoghue.

Gerry the Monk Hutch just missed out on a seat in 2024.

Can he pull off a surprise today?

Or will the Mary Lunatics show out and push Janice Boylan into the Dáil?

Or can the Sock Dems become the fourth largest party in the Dáil through former League of Ireland footballer Daniel Ennis?

The West was awake last November as Catherine Connolly romped home in the presidential election.

Who's going to take her Dáil seat today?

In a constituency that sprawls from Galway City out through Connemara up to Clifton and Cornemona, can Fine Gael pull off that rare thing, a government by-election win?

Or will independent Ireland's Noel Thomas rally the protest vote to enter the Dáil?

And in the constituency that this fledgling left-wing alliance was born, can it see home a seat for the left or see a blow to their chances of a lefty government in 2029?

Leaders under pressure, lots to play for and a long count expected over this weekend.