Justin Barrett

Justin Barrett (born 13 April 1971) is an Irish far-right politician and anti-abortion activist who has been the leader of the National Party since 2016.

His leadership of the party has been disputed since July 2023.

Barrett was born in Cork city in 1971 and was adopted when he was five years old by a family in Borrisokane, County Tipperary.

Slevin was his adopted parents' name.

He identified as Justin Slevin for a period but eventually settled on Barrett, his biological parents' name.

Barrett is a graduate in Business Studies from Athlone RTC.

Barrett's activism began in the 1990s, with the anti-abortion campaign group Youth Defence.

In 1991, he appeared before a district court for shoplifting a pair of shoes from Dunnes Stores in Athlone.

In 1991, he was involved in Young Fine Gael but left because of what he called the cynicism of the party.

From 1992 he became actively involved in the Irish anti-abortion movement, becoming the leader of Youth Defence.

As a student in Athlone RTC he unsuccessfully contested the election for the Presidency of Union of Students in Ireland.

During the 1995 divorce referendum, he was spokesman for the Youth Against Divorce campaign.

In April 1999, Barrett and seven other Youth Defence members were convicted of public order offences for a protest described at the time as a "mini-riot" outside the Adelaide Hospital that had taken place on 16 May 1998.

Despite requests from hospital staff, the son of a dying woman and Gardaí to be quiet, a Youth Defence protest outside the hospital got louder and lead to "pandemonium" when Gardaí intervened.

Some of the convictions were successfully appealed, two years later, and while Barret's appeal was disallowed, he was given the benefit of the Probation Act, meaning no criminal conviction was recorded against him.

In 2001, a referendum was held in Ireland to approve the Treaty of Nice.

However the Treaty of Nice was rejected by 54% of the Irish people in what is known as the Nice I referendum.

The following year a second referendum was held on the Treaty of Nice, known as the Nice II referendum.

Justin Barrett campaigned against the Nice Treaty in both referendums.

Barrett, then 31 years-old, established the No to Nice campaign with Rory O'Hanlon, a retired High Court judge.

During the second Nice campaign, Barrett became the centre of a controversy over his participation in neo-fascist events in Germany and Italy.

Barrett initially denied, and subsequently admitted that he had spoken at an event organised by the NPD, a far right, ultranationalist political party.

Justin Barrett has always claimed that he spoke at these events in an anti-abortion capacity on behalf on the Youth Defence Organisation.

He campaigned against the Treaty of Nice in 2002 and founded the National Party in 2016.

He was also involved in the campaign against the 2002 abortion referendum.

He contested the 2004 European Election as an independent, receiving 2.4% of the vote in the East constituency and failing to be elected.

Barrett also contested the 2021 Dublin Bay South by-election for the National Party, receiving 183 first-preference votes (0.68%), thus failing to be elected.

Since 2022, Barrett had publicly quoted Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf, performed Nazi salutes, and in 2023 appeared at an anti-immigration protest wearing a Nazi uniform.

He has been condemned for these actions by James Reynolds and others on the far-right.

A statement on the National Party's website in July 2023 stated he had been removed as leader and was replaced by James Reynolds.

He denies being ousted from the National Party.

He left Youth Defence in 2004 because he thought their methods of campaigning and interacting with people were becoming increasingly extreme and counterproductive.

In later years, Barrett himself sought a divorce in 2016.

By 2016, Youth Defence were claiming to have never heard of Justin Barrett, or ever to have had any dealing with him.

Barrett and the National Party campaigned for a No vote in the 2018 abortion referendum through the Abortion Never campaign, which functioned as "an Irish nationalist anti-abortion campaign".

His early activism focused mostly on campaigning in Irish referenda from a Eurosceptic, anti-abortion, anti-immigration, and social conservative perspective.

He subsequently however moved towards far-right politics with his involvement in the National Party.

Barrett has attracted controversy for his involvement with neo-Nazi groups and for making racist and homophobic remarks.

In September 2019, he controversially implied that, if in power, he would strip the Irish citizenship rights of local government politician Hazel Chu, in spite of the fact she had been born in Ireland and lived there for her entire life.

Barrett has never held or been elected to any public office.