The Social Democrats has said it has no plans to suspend Eoin Hayes for a second time after he was forced to apologise for wearing “brown makeup” on his face while dressing up as Barack Obama for Halloween 16 years ago.
In a statement to X, Deputy Hayes said the incident occurred while he was president of the University College Cork’s Student Union in 2009.
Deputy Hayes said he worked for Obama’s re-election campaign in 2012, and condemned racism “in all its forms”.
Statement pic.twitter.com/bhiLHF1KO8
— Eoin Hayes 🌍 (@Eoin_Hayes) September 15, 2025
Director at Lucy Michael Research and and Research Lead at The Irish Network Against Racism Doctor Lucy Michael told Newstalk Breakfast that while Deputy Hayes’ apology was “a really good first step”.
However, she said it should be remembered that “blackface is not a harmless prank”.
“I’ve read a lot of these apologies in my 24-year career of researching racism and most of them are much weaker,” she said.
“However, there’s a couple of things that he could have done better; one is to acknowledge who was actually harmed by it.
“He acknowledges all hurt and harm, but not who is actually harmed by it.”
Blackface is when a person intentionally darkens their skin in order to imitate a black person.
The practice originates from minstrel shows in the American south during the height of slavery.
White performers would darken their skin and perform mocking caricatures of African slaves, reinforcing racial stereotypes that black people were lazy, ignorant, and overall subpar to white Americans.
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“We’ve seen it disappear for 50 years now, and it’s really unusual for political figures – or anybody – to be photographed in black face these days,” Dr Michael said.
“2009 is not that long ago, as some people might like us to think.”
Dr Michael said that at the time, Deputy Hayes was “a young guy who had political ambitions, not naive, not in a backwater somewhere; in UCC”.
“I was a part time student officer back in the year 2000 – nine years before his involvement – and nobody in our student union would ever have done blackface,” she said.
According to Dr Michael, she would encourage Deputy Hayes to engage in more work with minority communities to repair the harm caused by his past actions.
Eoin Hayes dressed up as Obama in 2009.The incident comes just two months after Deputy Hayes was readmitted to the SocDems party.
He was placed on indefinite leave in December last year, after it was revealed that he provided incorrect information to the media about the sale of shares in his former employer Palantir Technologies.
Palantir supplies software to militaries, including the Israeli Defence Forces.
Social Democrats statement:
The Social Democrats said in a statement that the party "abhor all forms of racism".
"Deputy Hayes has acknowledged that what he did was wrong, offensive and hurtful," the statement said.
"He has taken full responsibility for his actions and issued an unreserved apology."
Main image: Eoin Hayes at Leinster House. Photo: Leon Farrell/© RollingNews.ie. 10/12/2024
