Ryan Tubridy addresses calls for him to run for President of Ireland

"What I have learned about life is to never say never to anything."

While he ruled out a run for Áras an Uachtaráin last year, the former Late Late Show host has since said he isn’t closing the door on the possibility in the future.

Tubridy was asked if he would ever run for President while speaking on Georgie Crawford's podcast, The Good Glow.

Ryan laughed and replied, “Why would you ask me that?” and Georgie said, “I think you would be the perfect President.”

“I feel like you’re cultured, I feel like you love people, you love Ireland. I think you would represent the country in such a magnificent way…”

“Well, that’s really kind of you to say that,” he responded. “I think a lot of people would burst out laughing if they heard that.

“But look, I come from a very political family, and there’s politics coursing through my veins, there’s no doubt about it.”

“As it happens, my grandfather was a TD in Galway in the 1920s. My uncle was the minister for foreign affairs and signed the Good Friday Agreement. His son Barry is an MEP now for Dublin. I have another cousin who’s in politics,” Ryan explained. “So it’s all coursing through the veins for sure.”

“I’m fascinated by politics and the political system. I watched the protests recently, and funnily enough, I found myself having quite a lot of sympathy for the strikers.

“I know the popular thing for a lot of people in the main parties was to say that they’re obstructive and breaking the law. I know they were, and they were both of those things, but I did feel that it required empathy rather than an iron fist.

“What would make your dad or your brother or your son drive the most important machine in their lives to the capital of whatever province they’re in to cause chaos? It’s not joy. There’s something wrong.”

“And it’s more than just not being able to pay a bill. It’s fundamental, it’s the essence of who we are. We need to look at that. And I was surprised by my own reaction, that sort of need to see if they are ok. I don’t know if I would have had the same reaction years ago.

“It’s strange, I just felt those people need to be minded a bit, and not in a patronising way, just in a societal way. It’s a strange thing, but that’s how I felt. If you have a man crying on the Six O’Clock News about his business, we have to ask ourselves, how do we fix that?

“Anyway, back to the question. What I have learned about life is to never say never to anything. So who knows?” Ryan confessed.

“I don’t think I could possibly rule out some political road in the future, because I’m so interested in it, and in people, and in this country.

“So yeah, I don’t know what that looks like, but I’d be shocked if I didn’t. Especially now that I have freedom to speak my mind.

“When you worked in RTÉ, you were beholden to the machine, and I was happy to. But now I can say what I damn well like, and I’ll tell you something, it feels good,” he added.