Justin Barrett (born 13 April 1971) is an Irish far-right politician who has been the leader of the National Party since 2016. Barrett's activism began in the 1990s, with the anti-abortion campaign group Youth Defence. He campaigned against the Treaty of Nice in 2002 and founded the National Party in 2016. Barrett and the National Party campaigned for a No vote in the 2018 abortion referendum through the Abortion Never campaign, which functioned as "an Irish nationalist anti-abortion campaign". His early activism focused mostly on campaigning in Irish referendums from a Eurosceptic, anti-abortion, anti-immigration, and social conservative perspective. He subsequently however moved towards far-right politics with his involvement in the National Party. Barrett has attracted controversy for his involvement with neo-Nazi groups and for making racist and homophobic remarks. In September 2019, he controversially implied that, if in power, he would strip the Irish citizenship rights of local government politician Hazel Chu, in spite of the fact she had been born in Ireland and lived there for her entire life. Barrett himself has never held or been elected to any public office. He contested the 2004 European Election as an independent, receiving 2.4% of the vote in the East constituency and failing to be elected. Barrett also contested the 2021 Dublin Bay South by-election for the National Party, receiving 183 first-preference votes (0.68%), thus failing to be elected. Early life Barrett was born in Cork city in 1971 and was adopted when he was five years old by a family in Borrisokane, County Tipperary. Slevin was his adopted parents' name. He identified as Justin Slevin for a period but eventually settled on Barrett, his biological parents' name. Barrett is a graduate in Business Studies from Athlone RTC. Political activism Early activism (1987–1991) In 1991, he was involved in Young Fine Gael but left because of what he called the cynicism of the party. Youth Defence (1992–2004) From 1992 he became actively involved in the Irish anti-abortion movement, becoming the leader of Youth Defence. As a student in Athlone RTC he unsuccessfully contested the election for the Presidency of Union of Students in Ireland. During the 1995 divorce referendum, he was spokesman for the Youth Against Divorce campaign. In later years, Barrett himself sought a divorce in 2016. In April 1999, Barrett and seven other Youth Defence members were convicted of public order offences for a protest described at the time