WHEN IT CAME down to it, election drop-out Jim Gavin secured a not insignificant number of votes at the polling stations on Friday.

A total of 103,568 people around the country sent Gavin their first-preference vote, giving him about one-quarter of the support secured by runner-up Heather Humphreys.

Gavin collected more than 100,000 first preferences despite his decision weeks ago to withdraw from the campaign over the revelation that he owed a €3,000 debt dating back to 2009 to a former tenant.

We have the breakdown of how each constituency voted – so what parts of the country supported Gavin the most (and the least)?

The number of first preferences received by Catherine Connolly, Heather Humphreys and Jim Gavin The Journal The Journal

Gavin’s biggest fans

One in every 20 of Jim Gavin’s votes came from Clare.

The county returned 5,047 votes for the Fianna Fáil candidate, the most votes for him of any constituency.

Gavin himself was born in Dublin but his parents are from Clare, and he described himself during his brief campaign as being a “Clare man at heart”.

Humphreys received 10,726 votes in Clare, while left-wing independent Catherine Connolly, who ultimately won the election, received 24,372.

On the other side of the country, the Dublin South-West constituency gave 4,084 first-preference votes to Gavin.

The constituency is close to Gavin’s home town of Clondalkin, though Clondalkin itself is located in the Dublin Mid-West constituency (which gave him 2,683 votes).

In Dublin South-West, Humphreys received 12,375 votes and Connolly won 28,079.

The third kindest constituency to Gavin was Dublin Bay North, where he amassed 3,815 votes. Humphreys took 11,815 and Connolly secured 28,501.  

Least support

Gavin managed to get at least 1,000 first preferences in every constituency, but only just about in some places, like in Dublin South-Central where he came away with a result of 1,266.

Humphreys wasn’t far ahead with just 3,723, while Connolly picked up 18,750.

Despite doing (relatively) well in some parts of Dublin, it was also where he saw some of his lowest levels of support. 

Dublin Central gave him only 18 more votes than Dublin South-Central did. He won 1,284 votes here, while Humphreys got 4,176 and Connolly got 15,848.

The third and fourth-worst constituencies for Gavin were Dublin North-West and Limerick City, where he took home 1,530 votes and 1,533 votes respectively.

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Home turf

How about Connolly and Humphreys – where did they perform the best?

Connolly topped the poll in nearly every constituency but none so high as in Galway West, where she has been a TD since 2016. She wiped the floor here with 35,441 first preferences.

She also did particularly well in Donegal with 33,286 votes.

In turn, Humphreys put in her best performance in her home county of Monaghan.

The Cavan-Monaghan constituency was the only one where she beat Connolly, coming away with 31,075 votes – though it wasn’t a total wash here for Connolly either; she picked up 20,273.

The next most generous constituency for Humphreys was Dún Laoghaire, where she received 16,358 votes, behind Connolly’s 21,138.