While his chances of nomination for the Presidency of Ireland are already low, pictures and videos of Conor McGregor partying in Dubai have convinced fans he’s actually not serious about it at all.
McGregor, a former two-weight champion in the UFC, officially announced plans for an unlikely political career earlier this month. However, despite raging on about his plan to run in a year-end Presidential election in his native Republic of Ireland, the Dubliner’s chances have been shot down immediately.
Namely, lobbied Oireachtas members boldly claimed they would not even consider nominating him for the largely ambassadorial role. This leaves the 36-year-old needing to find himself four separate county councils to publicly announce their approval of his bid to run.
Donning a promoter’s cap in the last 18 months, the Crumlin striker has interestingly entertained a bare-knuckle fighting debut before ever entering the Octagon to fight again.
However, after a recent Dubai event, a buzz-cut McGregor let his hair down. Attending an afterparty in Dubai, the Dubliner donned a pair of boxing gloves as he danced.
Flaunting his new ‘Notorious’ cigar brands, McGregor also took in the music, leading to some realistic questions from naysayers.
“Is he really running for President,” a user on Instagram asked. And while many questioned his apparent substance abuse, another commented, “It always looks like he doesn’t have any actual friends.”
— THE UFCGUY (@the_ufcguy) April 6, 2025
“Bro looks like a GTA boss you’ve gotta kill in a mission at the strip club lmao“, joked another.
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Interestingly, while McGregor’s presidential bid has garnered a lot of traction among his fans in America, back home, the situation has been entirely different.
McGregor’s popular but not for the right reasons
The UFC fighter’s popularity has waned in recent years after his bouts of violent outbursts and the regular cases of assaults levelled against him. Earlier last year, a jury of his peers found McGregor liable to have assaulted Nikita Hand and asked to pay €248,000 in damages, followed by an order to bear the victim’s legal costs.
This was followed by widespread criticism of the former UFC champion amid protests from his family and fans online. However, even the MMA community in Ireland saw an intentional erasure of McGregor as a once-great symbol of working class excellence.
It also hasn’t helped that the Irishman has tried to stir up domestic chaos, designed after US President Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant campaign through a variety of social media posts. He had even been investigated at one point for alleged incitement of the November 2023 Dublin riots.
In response to Ukranian people being allowed to vote in local elections, McGregor had taken to Twitter to claim Ireland was at war.
So, needless to say, his attempted presidential campaign is being seen as a farce more than anything else.
Law lecturer Jennifer Lawrence has now claimed that McGregor’s chances of success in a Presidential run are slim to none in her opinion.
“That individual (Conor McGregor) is not very popular in Ireland,” Lawrence said.
“It might look like he’s very popular outside of Ireland. Within Ireland, he is not that popular. He’s certainly not as popular as certain social media platforms would like to try and make outsiders think“, she added.
