Justice Angus Stewart of the Federal Court of Australia found One Nation leader Pauline Hanson racially discriminated against Greens Senator Mehreen Faruqi in a September 2022 tweet that demanded she “pack your bags and piss off back to Pakistan”.

The tweet was posted in response to Faruqi’s public social media comments on the death of Queen Elizabeth II on 9 September 2022, in which she said she could not “mourn the leader of a racist empire built on stolen lives, land and wealth of colonised people”.

Hanson has seven days to remove the tweet from the social media site – now known as “X” – and is on the hook for Faruqi’s costs. At the time of writing, the tweet was still published on Hanson’s account.

Justice Stewart agreed with an expert witness that the phrase “piss off back to Pakistan” was a variation of “go back to where you came from”. This is a “racist trope with a long history” that stems back to anti-immigrant and native beliefs from the White Australia Policy.

“Although the tweet does not explicitly target Muslims in Australia, it does so implicitly, born through the reference to Pakistan (i.e., the Islamic Republic of Pakistan), where 97 per cent of people identify as Muslim, and by targeting a prominent Muslim and commanding her to go back to Pakistan,” Justice Stewart said in his written reasons.

“I am comfortably satisfied that both groups of people in Australia that I have identified, being persons of colour who are migrants or of relatively recent migrant heritage and persons of colour who are Muslim, are reasonably likely … to have been offended (i.e., profoundly and seriously), insulted, humiliated and intimidated.”

Hanson defended her tweet as “done reasonably and in good faith in making a fair comment on an event and/or matter of public interest” and claimed it was an expression of a reasonably held belief.

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Justice Stewart dismissed this, finding there was no “rational relationship” between what she said and the purpose of the tweet, and it amounted to a contravention of the Racial Discrimination Act.

“With regard to good faith, there was no conscientious approach to advancing the exercise of Senator Hanson’s freedom of speech in a way that was designed to minimise the offence or insult, humiliation, or intimidation suffered by people affected by it,” he said.

“In contrast, Senator Hanson carelessly disregarded, or was wilfully blind to, its effect upon people who would be hurt by it.”

History of racism central to court’s finding

In her evidence, Faruqi shared experiences of racism in Australia, including incidents where she was made to feel that she was “treated differently or being mistrusted because she was a woman of colour, and when she was identifiable as being an immigrant and Muslim”.

These incidents intensified when she entered politics and was often told she was “not from Australia” and “doesn’t belong here”.

Hanson’s tweet “challenged her sense of belonging and her sense of self” and had a “triggering effect”, Faruqi said.

Already fearful of the “chorus of hate” that would follow Hanson’s tweet, Faruqi said she began to receive “intense abuse” across her social media accounts and in calls and emails to her office.

On the day she announced she was commencing the Federal Court proceedings, Faruqi shared with the court she received a threat on her social media that included the street address of her electoral office and the words: “See you real soon you f-----g dead c--t”.

Faruqi was found to have been an “impressive witness”, who provided “thoughtful and careful” evidence even when she was subjected to provocation in her cross-examination.

Nine witnesses who said Hanson’s tweet had an adverse effect on them also gave evidence of their experiences with racism in Australia.

Each shared they felt “humiliated and intimidated” by the tweet, and some said they had been told to “go back to where you came from”.

One witness told the court: “If someone like Senator Faruqi can be victimised by that kind of racism, then other immigrants and people of colour in Australia are even more vulnerable”.

Pauline Hanson’s ‘tendency’ to discriminate

In complete contrast to Faruqi, Hanson’s evidence was found to be evasive, argumentative and, at times, “inherently unbelievable”.

Justice Stewart was particularly dismissive of a claim that Hanson’s staff published tweets in her name for years without her knowledge and that she did not know other Twitter users responded to her posts.

He was also unable to accept Hanson gave the wording of her tweet some thought, as she claimed in her affidavit.

“Time and again, she said in oral evidence that she dictated the tweet in distress, disgust and anger and that she did not check the wording or the draft; she did not take the time to reflect on her chosen wording. I find that she framed the tweet spontaneously and in the heat of the moment,” Justice Stewart said.

Justice Stewart added that even if Hanson subjectively thought Faruqi insulted the late Queen, it did not explain “why her response was framed as anti-immigrant, racist and anti-Muslim, or exclude those as being a reason for the tweet being framed that way”.

Another of the central findings in Justice Stewart’s judgment was Hanson’s “long history” of making public statements that were anti-Muslim. In her oral evidence, Hanson not only accepted advocating for a ban on Muslim immigration but said she still believes in it.

Her repetition of these views justified a finding that Hanson “has a tendency to make negative, derogatory, discriminating or hateful statements in relation to, about or against people relevantly identified as persons of colour, migrants to Australia and Muslims, and to do so because of those characteristics”.

With that in mind, Justice Stewart said Hanson “reverted most easily to those messages when responding to a Muslim, immigrant woman of colour in anger in the heat of the moment, which is consistent with the views that she has espoused publicly for decades”.

Faruqi’s request for donation, anti-racism training dismissed

In addition to the tweet’s removal and costs, Faruqi asked the court to restrain Hanson from using the phrases “piss off back to Pakistan”, “go back to where you came from”, or any variation in public.

Justice Stewart said to make the order would prevent Hanson from saying in public she had been sanctioned for having tweeted “piss off back to Pakistan” and would “even stop her from apologising”.

Justice Stewart also refused to make Hanson “pin” a tweet to her X account that stated she was found to have contravened the Racial Discrimination Act because it would “not offer much by way of redress to Faruqi since she would have had the redress of being successful in this case” and the declaration of unlawful conduct.

A request for Hanson to undertake anti-racism training at her own expense was dismissed due to Justice Stewart’s concern that Hanson would not benefit from the training given the tendency evidence.

In addition, he said there was no evidence as to what this training would be, who would deliver it, and how it would be supervised.

This was a similar reason for dismissing a remedy that would have seen Hanson pay a $150,000 donation to the Sweatshop Literacy Movement in Western Sydney. Faruqi disavowed any monetary claim and submitted the charitable donation would instead be appropriate.

However, Justice Stewart said there was no evidence about the intended beneficiary, what services it offers, how well it manages its money, or whether it is in need of further funding.

“Moreover, it would appear that Senator Hanson was given very little notice of the identity of the intended beneficiary, so she has not been able to investigate or make inquiries about the appropriateness of it.

“In the circumstances, I am not satisfied that the donation order that is sought should be made,” Justice Stewart said.