Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar announces his resignation on March 20, 2024. (The Telegraph/YouTube screenshot)
Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar announced March 20 he will step down once his party selects his successor.
Varadkar, who is gay, also said he will immediately resign as Fine Gael’s leader.
“My reasons for stepping down are both personal and political,” said Varadkar in comments he made outside the government’s offices in Dublin, the Irish capital.
Varadkar, 45, became Ireland’s first gay prime minister in 2017.
He raised LGBTQ+ issues with Pope Francis when he visited Ireland in 2018.
Varadkar the following year attended a St. Patrick’s Day breakfast at then-Vice President Mike Pence’s official residence in D.C. with his husband, Dr. Matthew Barrett. Varadkar and Barrett last week attended a St. Patrick’s Day event that Vice President Kamala Harris and second gentleman Doug Emhoff hosted at the Naval Observatory.
Varadkar in 2020 stepped down after Fine Gael lost 15 Parliament seats in a general election, but remained in the Irish government. Varadkar once again became prime minister in 2022.
Varadkar announced his resignation four days after Irish voters rejected proposals that would have amended language in the country’s constitution that says a woman’s place is in the home and families are based on marriage. (Ireland in 2015 became the first country to extend marriage rights to same-sex couples through a referendum.)
The Irish government last year pledged to ban so-called conversion therapy. The country’s hate speech law has included gender identity since 2022.
“I’ve proudly made the country a more equal and more modern place when it comes to children, the LGBT community, equality for women and their bodily autonomy,” said Varadkar.
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