Top court rejects Pauline Hanson’s bid to overturn racial vilification ruling

One Nation leader Pauline Hanson has lost a court bid to overturn a damning court decision that she racially vilified Greens senator Mehreen Faruqi in a tweet telling her to “piss off back to Pakistan”.In a decision on Monday, the Full Court of the Federal Court rejected Hanson’s appeal against a decision of Justice Angus Stewart in 2024 that her post was anti-Muslim and conveyed a “strong form of racism”.One Nation leader Pauline Hanson and Greens deputy Mehreen Faruqi.SMHFaruqi launched proceedings against Hanson under racial discrimination laws after the comment on Twitter, now X, was posted on September 9, 2022.Stewart said in his decision in 2024 that Hanson’s post conveyed three interrelated messages, including that Faruqi, an Australian citizen who migrated from Pakistan in 1992, was a second-class citizen as an immigrant who should be “grateful for what she has and keep quiet”.The judge said expert evidence in the trial established that Hanson’s comment, which he described as a variant of the slogan “go back to where you came from”, was “a racist trope with a long history”.The tweet was also anti-Muslim and Islamophobic, Stewart said. He ordered Hanson to delete the post and pay Faruqi’s legal costs.Pauline Hanson and her barrister, Sue Chrysanthou, SC, outside the Federal Court in Sydney last year.Kate GeraghtyHanson’s comment was a response to a post by the Greens senator in which she noted the death of Queen Elizabeth II and said she could not “mourn the leader of a racist empire built on stolen lives, land and wealth of colonised peoples”.Hanson replied: “When you immigrated to Australia you took every advantage of this country … It’s clear you’re not happy, so pack your bags and piss off back to Pakistan.”Faruqi alleged Hanson’s post contravened section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act because the comment was reasonably likely to offend, insult, humiliate or intimidate her and others, and it was done because of Faruqi’s race, colour or national or ethnic origin.Stewart declared the post was unlawful. He found it was reasonably likely to have been “profoundly and seriously offensive, insulting, humiliating and intimidating … to the reasonable targeted person in the position of Senator Faruqi” as well as to “people of colour who are migrants to Australia or are Australians of relatively recent migrant heritage, and Muslims who are people of colour in Australia”.Faruqi outside the Federal Court in 2024 after winning her racial discrimination case.Dominic Lorrimer“Based on frequent public statements made by Senator Hanson over nearly three decades, the court has found that Senator Hanson has a tendency to make negative, derogatory, discriminating or hateful statements in relation to, about or against … persons of colour, migrants to Australia and Muslims, and to do so because of those characteristics,” the judge said.He rejected Hanson’s claim she did not know at the time of the tweet that Faruqi was Muslim.Hanson’s legal team had argued the comment was not racist and in any case fell within an exemption because she acted reasonably and in good faith in making a fair comment on a matter of public interest, and it was an “expression of a genuine belief”.The “angry personal attack” did not fall within that exemption, Stewart concluded.Hanson’s barrister, Sue Chrysanthou, SC, submitted during the appeal that “the court can’t sit in an ivory tower and assess [the comment] … to be offensive or insulting or humiliating or intimidatory without looking at the context”.“What your honours might consider … [not to] be acceptable discourse at an afternoon tea or in a court or in a meeting of a knitting club is not equivalent to the way that Australians engage on social media.”Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.More:CourtsRacismPauline HansonMehreen FaruqiGreensOne NationFor subscribersFrom our partners