A man has been arrested over threats made against Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Simon Harris online.
He was charged with making threats to Harris, intending for him to believe they would be carried out, to kill or cause serious harm, without lawful excuse.
Gardai said the arrest has been made in connection with threats posted on social media in the last week.
Grealish appeared in Galway District Court on Monday, where he was released on bail by a judge, despite objections by the Gardai.
He is due to reappear in court on Sept. 17.
It comes just days after another man was arrested in connection with a bomb threat made against Harris’s home.
The man, aged in his 50s, was arrested on Friday over the threat on June 26, which was allegedly made during a phone call to the Samaritans, a charity which offers emotional support to those in distress or feeling suicidal.
Harris’s wife and two young children were in the home at the time and Gardai searched the property, but found nothing.
After the incident, Harris, leader of the Fine Gael party in the Dáil (Irish parliament) branded the threat against him “utterly unacceptable”.
However, in comments on Sunday, Harris said he feels no more vulnerable now than he did a year ago, before he became Taoiseach.
“We live in a great country. We live in a country where people are kind and decent, and what angers me is that a few small people, small in number and small in mindset, seek to misrepresent the views of our people,” he added.
“People with no democratic mandate and no legitimacy, who hide behind computers and keyboards, seeking to intimidate elected representatives.
“We had elections recently and I don’t think any of those trolls stood. We will in due course have a general election, they are welcome to stand, too, but I don’t expect they will.”
After online threats against him and his family were posted last week, Harris said that social media must not be allowed to turn into the “Wild West.”
“It’s totally unacceptable that any media platform—digital, online, print—would allow a threat towards anybody remain for a significant period of time,” he said on Wednesday.
‘Era of Self Regulation Over’
Harris went on to say that Ireland would soon be introducing new measures and pecuniary penalties against social media companies, which could be in the range of tens of millions of euros, under an online safety code.He said he was “very proud” of the work underway at media regulator Coimisiun na Mean, adding that the Irish republic was “ahead of many, many other European countries” on the issue.
Harris said that as early as this year, binding measures could be put in place, which would “hit these companies where it hurts” if they fail to comply.
He added that the proposed codes would allow for financial penalties and also include measures to hold directors of social media companies “personally responsible.”
“The era of self-regulation of these companies is well and truly over,” Harris said.
“This will be the year in which there will be binding codes, financial sanctions and personal liabilities on social media companies—and that day can’t come quickly enough.”
