Peter Casey

He attempted to be elected to Seanad Éireann as part of the Industrial and Commercial Panel in 2016. At his Seanad campaign launch he said he intended to support foreign direct investment, indigenous business development and job creation.[11] In the count, Casey received 14 votes; 113 were required to secure a seat.

On 30 August 2018, Casey announced his intention to seek a nomination for that year's Irish presidential election. He became the third 'dragon' from the Irish version of Dragons' Den to seek a nomination after Gavin Duffy and Seán Gallagher.[12] Casey uploaded a promotional video entitled "Platform for President of Ireland" to YouTube.[13] He secured the nominations of four local authorities; Kerry County Council, Clare County Council, Limerick City and County Council and Tipperary County Council.[14] He criticised incumbent President Michael D. Higgins for "extolling the virtues" of Fidel Castro and Hugo Chávez.[15]

On 17 October, Casey attracted a mixture of criticism and praise when he made comments on the Irish Independent's Floating Voter podcast regarding social housing that was offered to, and refused by, Irish Travellers in Thurles, County Tipperary. Casey described Irish Travellers as "basically people camping in someone else's land" who are "not paying their fair share of taxes in society". There were calls for Casey to withdraw from the race, including from Traveller activist group Pavee Point. Other candidates condemned Casey's comments.[16][17] In the Dáil, Tánaiste Simon Coveney referred to Casey's comments as the "lowest common denominator politics" and defended the Government's decision to recognise Irish Travellers as an ethnic minority in 2017, in contrast to Casey's belief that Irish Travellers share their ethnicity with the general Irish population.[18] Casey visited the Thurles housing development for himself on 18 October, under Garda protection, and faced demonstrations by Traveller activist groups.[19] On 19 October, Casey released a statement announcing he was "taking the weekend off from the campaign to think carefully about whether to continue in the race", adding that "I do not want the people of Ireland to elect me as President of Ireland just based on one statement I made".[20] He announced that he was staying in the presidential election.[21] Before the traveler comments Casey found himself dead last in a pack of six candidates with 2 percent of support, he then shot up swiftly in support after the comments.[22]

He also said that in his opinion that Ireland is a "welfare-dependent state" which has led to a "sense of entitlement that's become unaffordable".[21][23]

Casey finished second to incumbent Michael D. Higgins, securing 342,727 (23.3%) votes.[24]

A day after the election, Casey indicated that he planned to join Fianna Fáil and run for one of the seats in the Donegal constituency in the next general election. Fianna Fáil TD Niall Collins later stated on The Week in Politics that the Fianna Fáil ticket for the constituency was full, saying that Casey should "realise that you can't just rock up to political parties and think that you can get your way".[25] Casey responded by saying "I'm 100% serious. If the consensus after talking to them is they don't want me, I’ll form a new party and I’ll call it the new Fianna Fáil."[26] In February 2019 Casey said that he would run as an independent in the next general election.[27]

In April 2019 he announced he had handed in his nomination papers to contest the 2019 European Parliament election in the Midlands–North-West constituency.[28] In May 2019 while making a speech in Dunboyne, County Meath during the campaign, Casey was filmed declaring "The face of Ireland is changing. People say 'you’re racist'. Of course I'm racist, I'm a very proud Irish man". When questioned about this statement on The Floating Voter Podcast, a series run by the Irish Independent he said that he makes “no apologies” for describing himself as a racist and continued to criticise the EU’s policies on migration.[29] He was not elected.[30]

He contested the 2020 general election as an independent candidate for the Donegal constituency, and also contested Dublin West, the constituency of incumbent Taoiseach Leo Varadkar.[31] He received 213 first preference votes in Dublin West and was eliminated on the second count.[32] In Donegal, he received 1,142 first preference votes and did not win a seat.[33]