BOSTON — "Boy, did I back the wrong horse."

That's how Boston Globe columnist Kevin Cullen opens his latest piece — and honestly, it might be the only accurate thing he's written about Seamus Culleton in weeks.

Culleton, 38, is the Wakefield plasterer Cullen turned into the face of immigration injustice. A hard-working Irishman. A loving husband. One interview away from his green card when big bad ICE snatched him from a Saugus Home Depot last September. The Globe ate it up. Irish media ate it up. Somebody even started a GoFundMe.

There was just one small problem: almost none of it held up.

Mass Daily News reported on the cracks in Culleton's story before most outlets had even started asking questions. Since then, it's been a parade of revelations — and not one of them came from the Globe.

Irish reporters did the job Cullen wouldn't

The unraveling started at a press conference called by Culleton's lawyer, Ogor Winnie Okoye, at her Lynn office. It was Irish journalists — not Globe reporters — who asked the obvious question: did Okoye know her client had unresolved drug charges back in Ireland?

She didn't. Culleton had been charged at 20 with possessing 25 Ecstasy tablets and apparently legged it to America in 2009 rather than face the music. Okoye said she was "blindsided." ICE didn't know either — their filings only mentioned that Culleton had overstayed his 90-day visa by a casual 16 years.

But the pills were just the warm-up.

The court records nobody at the Globe bothered to pull

While Cullen was writing love letters to Culleton's character, the Boston Herald did something radical: they checked the court records. The Daily Mail picked up the story and ran with it.

What they found was ugly.

According to Boston Police reports, Culleton's ex-wife — who is Black — filed protective orders against him between 2019 and 2021. The reports allege he physically abused her, forcing her to move out of their apartment in November 2019. The very next day, police were called to her parents' house after Culleton allegedly started harassing her and, according to the police report, "wishing death on her."

It gets worse. In a separate incident, his ex-wife received a text containing a racial slur calling her "[expletive] scum" — which she told police she believed came from Culleton. Officers documented the alleged restraining order violation. Nobody arrested him. A court date was set for July 2021. Neither party showed. Case dropped.

This is Kevin Cullen's "sympathetic Everyman." This is the guy the Globe held up as proof that ICE is out of control.

Radio host Howie Carr posted on X, pointing out that the Daily Mail had picked up the Herald's reporting on what he called "the Irish illegal alleged racist wife abuser" who "was lionized by the Boston Globe as a victim of MAGA" — while sharing a Mass Daily News story about a Nortenos gang member deported three times whom ICE had just nabbed in Massachusetts.

Daily Mail picks up Boston Herald story about the Irish illegal alleged racist wife abuser.

He was lionized by the Boston Globe as a victim of MAGA.

Irishman detained by ICE is racist woman beater, records allege https://t.co/XhuEAA3jnO via @DailyMail— Howie Carr (@HowieCarrShow) February 25, 2026

Kevin Cullen & Boston Globe working on their next sob story about their latest cholo crush targeted just because he's "brown."

Check out this article: ICE Boston busts face-tattooed Nortenos gang member deported THREE times with assault, carjacking, and terrorizing charges…

— Howie Carr (@HowieCarrShow) February 27, 2026

And then came the Trump card

So what does Cullen do when confronted with the fact that his guy is, by any reasonable measure, a disaster? Does he ask how he got it so wrong? Does he question why he didn't check the records himself?

No. He talks about Donald Trump.

Roughly half the column is dedicated to arguing that Culleton's critics are hypocrites because they support a president with "three marriages and 34 felony convictions." He throws in the pardon of Honduras's former president for good measure. The message is clear: sure, Culleton might be bad, but what about Trump?

It's the journalistic equivalent of getting caught cheating on a test and pointing out that the kid next to you was cheating too.

The questions Cullen skips right past

Here's what a curious journalist might have asked:

When did Cullen first learn about the Irish drug charges? Did he do any background checking at all before making Culleton a cause? The lawyer says she knew nothing — did Cullen even ask?

The domestic violence allegations were in Boston Police records the whole time. The Herald found them. The Daily Mail found them. Irish reporters found the drug charges in minutes. The Globe, with its investigative team and its resources, found exactly nothing. Because it never looked.

There's also the small matter of a forged signature. Both Culleton and his lawyer claim someone in the government forged his name on a deportation consent document. DHS hasn't responded. Cullen mentions it once and moves on — which is bizarre, because if it's true, it's a far bigger story than any of this.

But that would require actual reporting.

The real moral

Cullen closes with a tidy line about how immigrants have to be "clean as a whistle" while the president "can do whatever he bloody well please." It sounds great. It's the kind of thing that gets shared on social media by people who only read the last paragraph.

It's also a dodge.

The story here isn't about double standards for immigrants and presidents. It's about a columnist who picked a poster boy without doing his homework, watched the whole thing blow up in public, and decided the best use of his column inches was to talk about someone else entirely.

The Herald checked the records. The Daily Mail checked the records. Irish media checked the records. Kevin Cullen wrote a column about Trump.

Two things can be true at the same time, as Cullen himself likes to say. ICE can be heavy-handed. And a Globe columnist can be absolutely terrible at his job.