What to make of the Seamus Culleton case
Posted February 19 2026 - 0600
Seamus Culleton should find out sometime before the end of February whether he’ll be deported to Ireland. His Boston law firm won a reprieve just before he was put on a plane to Dublin from El Paso, Texas, where he’s been in ICE detention since October.
How his case came to this point
Turns out Culleton had unfinished business with the criminal justice system in Ireland when he got picked up by ICE in September 2025. The arresting agents wouldn’t have known it, but 20 years ago he left Ireland for America rather than appear in court on drug charges.
None of this information was available a week ago when his story broke. Coverage was mostly sympathetic to Culleton. Here’s a guy who came to America, overstayed his visa, worked hard, got married, applied for a green card and ended up in detention in El Paso. At the time, former Ireland ambassador to the U.S., Paul Mulhall said “if his case got into the US media environment it will refute the notion that everyone in ICE detention is a hardened criminal.”
Well, his case went viral but not in the way Mulhall imagined.
It took about two days for the news to break that Culleton is still wanted on a warrant out of Co. Kilkenny to face the charges he left Ireland to avoid all those years ago. A day after that his twin daughters talked to the tabloid Daily Mail about their bad dad. Tawdry stuff.
Here are five takeaways from the Seamus Culleton case to consider.
ONE - Eilis O’Hanlon of the Irish Independent was skeptical of Culleton’s case BEFORE the narrative went sideways. She called him out for comparing the conditions in the El Paso ICE facility to a concentration camp. It would have been less insensitive and more accurate to reference the internment camps where Japanese American citizens were taken during World War Two.
TWO - We know know that in 2009 he was arrested, charged with possessing 25 MDMA tablets (Ecstasy or Molly) and with trying to destroy the evidence only to flee from Ireland a wanted man. It wasn’tknown a week ago. How could it have been known when he was arrested in September in Massachusetts? His five-month detention in Texas strictly for overstaying his visa seems excessive.
THREE - Don’t expect Taoiseach Micheal Martin to bring up the case of Seamus Culleton when he meets Trump in the Oval Office next month. He was urged to do so before the character issues came up. He hasn’t said if he’ll mention this case to Trump. Smart money says he won’t.
FOUR - Seamus Culleton wouldn’t be the first Irishman in trouble with the law to head for America. I’m reading a book called “The Killing of Major Denis Mahon.” Guess where the men suspected of murdering the unpopular landlord during the Famine went? Culleton himself had uncles who were twins and who both went to America and lived without status for years.
FIVE -Culleton's troubles would be closer to being over if he’d accepted the offer to self deport. ICE would have paid his air fare back to Dublin. Instead, he insisted on staying in America where he’d like to start a family. Couldn’t Culleton sincerely want to stay here because he loves the country that’s given him a second chance. Here’s the other version of why he didn’t accept ICE’s offer of a one-way ticket home: Culleton, who is married to an American, faces drug charges back home, and would rather stay in ICE custody than face justice. We may soon find out how serious those drug charges are. Or if there are other reasons he doesn’t want to go home.