Morgan McSweeney

Morgan James McSweeney (born 19 April 1977) is an Irish political strategist for the British Labour Party. He served as Downing Street Chief of Staff under Prime Minister Keir Starmer from October 2024 until his resignation in February 2026. A close colleague and adviser to Starmer over many years, he was ranked first in a 2024 New Statesman poll on influential people in UK left-wing politics, and has been compared to Dominic Cummings and Peter Mandelson.

McSweeney joined the Labour Party in 1997, motivated by backing for the Good Friday Agreement, and in 2001 he was hired to work as an intern receptionist and then in the party's attack and rebuttal unit in Millbank. From 2008 until 2010, he campaigned with David Evans, Jon Cruddas, Margaret Hodge and Hope not Hate against the British National Party. Before working with Starmer, McSweeney ran council and leadership campaigns for Steve Reed in 2006 and Liz Kendall in 2015, and formed the Labour Together think tank in 2017. In 2020, he led Starmer's successful Labour leadership campaign and held senior roles under Starmer including Chief of Staff to the Leader of the Opposition, Labour's director of campaigns, and campaign director for the party during the 2024 general election, which the party won.