 David was transferred to Richmond Barracks in Dublin, where he was sentenced to death, though later was reduced to penal servitude for life.Subsequently, he was moved to HM Prison Pentonville in England though released from there within the year..

David Kent was elected unopposed as a Sinn Féin MP for the Cork East constituency at the 1918 general election.In January 1919, Sinn Féin MPs refused to recognise the Parliament of the United Kingdom and instead assembled at the Mansion House in Dublin as a revolutionary parliament called Dáil Éireann, though Kent did not attend.