Mary Lou McDonald
President of Sinn Féin
Ireland Thinks/Sunday Independent asks whether people are satisfied or dissatisfied with each leader's performance, but only publishes the satisfied % — no dissatisfied breakdown is shown here because none has been published to verify. This figure carries a margin of error of ±2.6pp at 95% confidence (n=1,384). "Weighted avg" is satisfaction averaged across 8 real readings with a 3-month recency half-life (weighted by actual elapsed time between polls, since this series isn't evenly spaced), so it's less sensitive to any single reading's noise than the latest figure alone.
A separate, one-off Business Post/Red C, via Irish Examiner favourability reading (May 2026) scored Mary Lou McDonald 46/100 — a different question and scale, not directly comparable to the satisfaction % above, shown here only because it's the one other real reading found for this leader.
Satisfaction over time
% satisfied with Mary Lou McDonald's performance. Solid dots are each real poll's actual reading; the dashed line is a 3-month recency-weighted average (weighted by real elapsed time, not by reading count) with a shaded ±2.6pp margin-of-error band. These are the 8 real, individually-sourced readings found since January 2025 — coverage of this specific question is uneven, so gaps of several months between points are real gaps in available reporting, not missing data on this site's part.
Mary Lou McDonald has led Sinn Féin since 2018, succeeding Gerry Adams. Under her leadership, Sinn Féin has become the largest opposition party in Ireland, advocating for Irish reunification and progressive social policies.