Ireland will elect a new president on October 24. But not all Irish people will get to vote. Residents of Northern Ireland are not eligible. A Northern Irish candidate can stand in the election – indeed, the Belfast-born Mary McAleese served as president from 1997-2011 – but not vote for themselves, unless they live in the Republic.

This time, one of the two remaining candidates in the race is an Ulster Protestant. Heather Humphreys is a Presbyterian from county Monaghan – one of three Ulster counties that were not included in the formation of Northern Ireland. She is, therefore, a “northerner” – albeit not from Northern Ireland.

Humphreys has sought to use this dualism – being “of Ulster”, but also “of the Irish republic” – to suggest that she understands both political traditions on the island, Ulster unionist and Irish nationalist. But this pitch, and more specifically Humphreys’s religious heritage, have also been turned against her.

Humphreys is standing for Fine Gael, a centre-right Irish party which is part of the current coalition government in Dublin. Jim Gavin, representing Fianna Fáil, the other centrist party in the coalition, was forced to withdraw from the race over a controversy involving his personal financial dealings. This has left Humphreys facing just Catherine Connolly, an independent candidate but former Labour party member who is backed by most of the left-leaning parties in Ireland.........

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