Michael D. Higgins
Michael D. Higgins was born in Moyross, Ireland on April 18th, 1941 and is the Politician. At the age of 83, Michael D. Higgins biography, profession, age, height, weight, eye color, hair color, build, measurements, education, career, dating/affair, family, news updates, and networth are available.
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Michael Daniel Higgins (Irish: Mícheál Dónal Ó hUigínn; born 18 April 1941) is an Irish politician, poet, sociologist, and broadcaster who has served as the ninth President of Ireland since November 2011. Higgins served as a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Galway West constituency from 1981 to 1982 and 1987 to 2011.
He served as Minister for Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht from 1993 to 1997 and Mayor of Galway from 1981 to 1982 and 1990 to 1991.
He was a Senator from 1973 to 1977, upon being nominated by the Taoiseach and from 1983 to 1987 for the National University of Ireland.
He was the President of the Labour Party from 2003 to 2011, until he resigned following his election as President of Ireland.He has used his time in office to address issues concerning justice, social equality, social inclusion, anti-sectarianism, anti-racism and reconciliation.
He made the first state visit by an Irish President to the United Kingdom in April 2014. Higgins ran for a second term as President of Ireland in 2018 and was re-elected in a landslide victory.
Higgins attained the largest personal mandate in the history of the Republic of Ireland, with 822,566 first preference votes.
Higgins' second presidential inauguration took place on 11 November 2018.
Early life
Higgins was born on 18 April 1941 in Limerick. His father, John Higgins, was from Ballycar, County Clare, and was a lieutenant with the Charleville Company, 3rd Battalion, 2nd Cork Brigade of the Irish Republican Army. John, along with his two brothers Peter and Michael, had been active participants in the Irish War of Independence.
When John's father's health grew poor, with alcohol abuse as a contributing factor, John sent Michael, aged five, and his four-year-old brother to live on his unmarried uncle and aunt's farm near Newmarket-on-Fergus, County Clare. His elder twin sisters remained in Limerick. He was educated at Ballycar National School, County Clare and St. Flannan's College, Ennis.
As an undergraduate at University College Galway (UCG), he served as vice-auditor of the college's Literary and Debating Society in 1963–64, and rose to the position of auditor in the 1964–65 academic year. He also served as president of UCG Students' Union in 1964–65. In 1967, Higgins graduated from the American Indiana University Bloomington with a Master of Arts degree in Sociology. He also briefly attended the University of Manchester.
In his academic career, he was a statutory lecturer in the Department of Political Science and Sociology at UCG and was a visiting professor at Southern Illinois University. He resigned his academic posts to concentrate fully on his political career.
He is a fluent Irish language speaker and also speaks Spanish.
Family life
His wife, Sabina Higgins (née Coyne), is an actress and a native of Cloonrane, a townland in County Galway near Ballindine, County Mayo. She grew up on a farm there in a family of five girls and two boys.
Higgins met Coyne in 1969, at a party in the family home of journalist Mary Kenny in Dublin. Higgins proposed over Christmas 1973, and they were married the year after. They have four children: Alice Mary, Daniel, and twins, John and Michael Jr.; Alice Mary was elected to Seanad Éireann in 2016. He has two Bernese Mountain Dogs named Bród and Misneach (Pride and Courage); Another Bernese dog Síoda, died in 2020.
Political career (1973–2011)
Higgins first joined Fianna Fáil in UCG as a mature student and was elected as the country's branch chairman in 1966; he resigned to the Labour Party shortly thereafter. In the general elections of 1969 and 1973, he was a Labour candidate, but on both counts he was defeated. Eamon Gilmore, the future leader of Labour and Tánaiste, who was then a UCG undergraduate, was one of the many people who canvassed for him. Higgins was introduced by Taoiseach Liam Cosgrave in 1973 to the 13th Seanad Éireann. He was first elected to Dáil Éireann at the 1981 general election as a Labour Party TD. He was re-elected at the February 1982 election, but returned to the Seanad after being elected by the National University constituency. He served as Mayor of Galway on two occasions, 1982-1983 and 1991–1992. He was one of the key figures in the Labour Party during the 1980s, alongside Emmet Stagg, who opposed entering coalition.
Higgins, a politician who voted in 1987 general election and then stayed in office until the 2011 general election. He joined the Cabinet in 1993 as Minister of Arts, Culture, and the Gaeltacht. During his tenure as minister, he scrapped Section 31 of the Broadcasting Act, reconstituted the Irish Film Board, and installed Teilif's Gaeilge, which later became known as TG4 in Ireland. In 2000, he was called to the Labour Party front bench. Higgins succeeded Proinsias De Rossa in the symbolic role of the Labour Party's President in 2003, while still serving as the party's foreign affairs spokesperson.
Higgins expressed his disinterest in challenging the Labour Party's presidential election in 2004. The party voted against running a candidate in the 2004 race, seeing Mary McAleese as unbeatable.
He declared in October 2010 that he would not be running in the 2011 general election. He had been living in a two-bed apartment at Grattan Hall on Mount Street, Dublin, until this point. He also has a family home in Galway.
Higgins declared in September 2010 that he was interested in being nominated by the Labour Party for the 2011 presidential election. He announced ahead of the election and reiterated during it that he would not seek a second term of office and that even though being allowed to do so.
At a special convention in Dublin on 19 June 2011, he was voted as a candidate for the presidency over a special convention, defeating former senator Kathleen O'Meara and former party adviser Ferlay. Martin Sheen, a Hollywood actor who referred to Higgins as a "dear friend," supported his candidacy. Higgins assisted his rival David Norris by urging his Dublin City Council colleagues not to obstruct Norris' nomination process, according to Hedge, who said that the nomination criteria were "outdated."
When canvassing in Meath, Higgins was confronted by former Tara mines workers. The employees were furious because their pensions were cut. Higgins was also pursued by his links to the Fianna Fáil party, and he revealed on October 13 that he had been elected chairman of the UCG Fianna Fáil university cumann in 1966. He confessed to smoking marijuana while attending a University in the United States. Nevertheless, media reports claimed he was "spared the ardent grilling Miriam O'Callaghan meted out to some of the others" during the Prime Time debate. Higgins said if elected and not to be a "handmaiden" to the government, he would be a neutral president. The Labour Party's budget for the campaign was within €320,000.
Higgins was declared the winner with 1,007,104 votes on October 29, 2011, two days after the republic's history, a far more than any Irish politician. Thousands of people descended on Galway streets to welcome him home the following day. His humble roots, poetry, and intelligence were chronicled in international media coverage, with The Washington Post noting that "local satirists often depict him as an elf, hobbit, or leprechaun speaking in riddles and verse." He is Ireland's first president to have served in both Houses of the Oireachtas, having served in both Houses of the Oireachtas (Lower House) and Seanad Éireann (Upper House).
Higgins and his family dined his predecessor Mary McAleese and her husband Martin for lunch at ras an Uachtaráin on 3 November, just before his inauguration. He gave Niall Tóibn an award and gained his own standing ovation as he entered the Irish Film Institute that night. He attended a crucial football game at Terryland Park on Saturday, wearing his scarf of his favorite team and greeting "Welcome home to Galway, Mr President" on a large banner hanging from a stand.