Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald has said Jonathan Dowdall had no business in the Sinn Féin party.
Speaking during a Dáil debate on organised crime, she said he "joined the party in June 2013 and left in February 2015. It was March 2016 when his criminal activity was uncovered".
She said when she met him first "he was a north inner-city kid who had worked really hard and done really well".
"We now know this was not the real Jonathan Dowdall. A man who would go on to commit heinous crime. He, and he alone, is responsible for his actions. He has been tried, he has been convicted before the courts," she added.
"If I had known for a second what he would be capable of, what he would go on to do, he wouldn't have been near me, he wouldn't have been near Sinn Féin and he certainly wouldn't have been running for public office. I would not tolerate that."
She said her party stands "100% with law abiding citizens, the members of An Garda Síochána, the courts system, including the Special Criminal Court against the threat of organised crime".
Fine Gael's Colm Brophy said "there are many serious questions unanswered by Deputy McDonald and her political protégé turned gangland torturer".
He said that in 2014 when Dowdall was resigning from the party, Deputy McDonald paid tribute saying: "He will be missed in his elected role by me and the local party organisation".
"The public deserve to know every aspect of this sorry affair and Deputy McDonald needs to come clean," he said.
Fine Gael's Fergus O'Dowd asked a series of questions to the Sinn Féin leader about whether she took actions to ensure Mr Dowdall remained on as a Sinn Féin councillor in 2014.
He said: "On Monday, Ms Justice Tara Burns called Dowdall a 'ruthless, base, callous criminal’ who was a suspected IRA member and associate of garda killer Pearse McAuley. So, was Jonathan Dowdall a member of a terrorist organisation while he was a member of Sinn Féin?"
He added that if the polls are right, in over a year's time, Sinn Féin will be on the government side of the house and Fine Gael will be on the opposition benches and they will have to take their questions.
Ceann Comhairle Seán Ó Fearghaíl said he is inclined to regard the series of questions posed as rhetorical "as we are dealing with statements, not questions and answers. There really isn’t an opportunity for the Government side to hold the opposition to account, it’s the job of the opposition to hold the Government to account".
Earlier, there was criticism from a number of deputies that the Dáil session had originally been classified as statement on gangland activity, before being rebranded as statements on organised crime.
Sinn Féin's Louise O’Reilly said the term "gangland is used all too often and it is offensive to the hardworking decent people who are forced to put up with the scourge of crime in their communities".
She said "most of these communities totally and utterly reject these gangs, and they deserve better, they deserve to feel safe".
Labour Deputy Aodhán Ó Ríordán warned against demonising areas by calling them "gangland".
He said: "If we are to talk about drugs and organised crime the emphasis also needs to be on diversion and education. It has to be a fully rounded debate. It can't just be more law and more gardaí".
He said when he was teaching in a primary school in Dublin, he noticed the stereotypes that persist about certain communities, "the only time they heard someone talking on the radio in their accent was someone who was stupid or untrustworthy".
He told the story of an eight-year-old child making a Mother's Day card at school. When she was asked why she wrote Mum on her card rather than 'Ma', which is what she would usually call her mother, she said "it’s because Ma is awful common".
"She was eight and she knew the word that she used to describe her mother was not good enough."
