Former Ireland Prime Minister of Indian Origin Leo Varadkar to Join Washington, D.C.-based Public Relations Firm

Leo Varadkar, Ireland’s former taoiseach or prime minister, like any good Irishman, is moving to America. He is joining a Washington, D.C.-based public relations firm Penta Group. The 46-year-old will officially join the company next month. Penta acquired the Irish public relations firm Hume Brophy in 2023, which was set up by John Hume, son of the former Social Democratic and Labour Party leader John Hume, and Dublin businessman Eoin Brophy, according to the BBC. 

In a statement welcoming Varadkar, Matt McDonald, CEO of Penta Group said the former lawmaker’s “deep commitment to evidence-based policymaking and strategic leadership aligns seamlessly with Penta’s mission.” Additionally, his “extensive policy expertise and unwavering commitment to evidence-based policy-making will be a major asset to Penta and its clients,” McDonald said. 

Varadkar resigned as prime minister in March last year, citing personal and political reasons, after serving 20 years as a public representative in Ireland. He also resigned as leader of the Fine Gael party in the ruling coalition. His surprise announcement came 15 months into his second stint as prime minister. He said he no longer felt he was the “best person” to lead Ireland. “One part of leadership is knowing when the time has come to pass on the baton and then having the courage to do it. That time is now.”

While he was “deeply grateful” for his time in office, he said he had reached the end of the road as Taoiseach. “Politicians are human beings and we have our limitations,” he said. “We give it everything until we can’t anymore. And then we have to move on.” 

The son of an Indian-born doctor and an Irish nurse made history in 2017 as the first gay and first biracial leader of the majority-Catholic country. At the time, he was widely seen as embodying the liberalization of a country once regarded as one of the most socially conservative in Europe. BBC.

He served twice as taoiseach in coalition governments – first from June 2017 to June 2020 and then again from December 2022. He returned to power in December 2022, as part of a coalition government. His return was barely two months after Rishi Sunak was elected prime minister of Britain, making it the first time that the two countries had leaders of Indian heritage. 

Varadkar’s first term was dominated by Ireland’s bullish response to Brexit and insistence that no “hard border” could be re-imposed between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. BBC As the Covid-19 pandemic began to rapidly spread to Europe, Mr Varadkar’s Fine Gael party lost seats in the general election in February 2020. It took several months to form a new coalition government — with Fine Gael teaming up with its old Civil War rivals in the Fianna Fáil party to share power in an unusual “revolving taoiseach” deal. The 2020 deal meant Mr Varadkar served half a government term as tánaiste (deputy prime minister), under Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin as taoiseach.

Varadkar was born in the suburbs of Dublin to Ashok and Miriam, who met in Slough and lived in Leicester and India, returning to Dublin in 1973. The couple has two other children: Sophia, a neurologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London; and Sonia, a midwife at the Coombe Hospital in Dublin. 

A Village magazine profile of Varadkar said he was brought up Catholic and educated at St. Francis National School in his hometown of Blanchardstown. A trained physician, educated at King’s Hospital School, Palmerstown, and Trinity College-Dublin, he has represented the Dublin-West constituency in parliament since 2007.

After graduation, he spent several years working as a junior doctor at Connolly Hospital Blanchardstown before qualifying as a GP in 2010. He was only 20 and in his second year in medical school when he contested the local elections in 1999 — but he scored 380 first preference votes and was eliminated on the fifth count, The Irish Independent reported. 

He was co-opted onto Fingal County Council in 2004, before being elected to the Irish Parliament in the 2007 general election. He was immediately appointed as Fine Gael’s spokesman for Enterprise, Trade and Employment. He was re-elected in 2011 when the party came into power and was made transport minister. In a cabinet reshuffle in 2014, Varadkar replaced James Reilly as health minister. He was returned to the Parliament in the 2016 general election and was subsequently handed the job of Social Protection Minister.

In a radio interview on Jan. 18, 2015, on the occasion of his 36th birthday, Varadkar revealed he was gay, becoming the first openly gay cabinet minister in Irish history. He was a prominent supporter of the Yes campaign in the same-sex marriage referendum the following May. “It is not something that defines me,” he told the listeners. “I’m not a half-Indian politician or a doctor or a politician or a gay politician for that matter,” he said, adding, “It’s just a part of who I am, it doesn’t define me, it is part of my character I suppose.”

Since then he has  been with Dr. Matthew Barrett, a cardiologist. Throughout the years, the couple have received praise for being so open about their relationship; however, in the past year or so, they’ve taken a step back from social media to lead a more private life together.