Liberal Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price says she has nothing to apologise for over her comments about Indian migrants, despite falsely claiming Labor is deliberately bringing them to Australia to boost its vote.
Speaking at a wide-ranging press conference in Parliament, Senator Price also repeated her calls for harsher penalties for desecrating the Australian flag and argued last weekend's mass anti-immigration protests across the country "weren't necessarily protests".
On Wednesday evening, Senator Price told the ABC the Albanese government was deliberately bringing in immigrants "from particular countries over others" — specifically Indian people — to strengthen its vote. Within hours of the broadcast, the Coalition's defence industry spokeswoman walked back the comments.
"Australia maintains a longstanding and bipartisan non-discriminatory migration policy. Suggestions otherwise are a mistake," she said.
"My remarks were made in a wide-ranging interview on ABC where I sought to highlight issues of uncontrolled mass migration and ruptures to social cohesion."
However, on Thursday, Senator Price told reporters she did not believe she had "anything to apologise about".
"In the context of discussing the marches that took place on the weekend, it was the ABC interviewer who pushed the issue, who brought up the issue of anti-Indian migration," she said.
"What I was doing was highlighting the fact that there is huge concern for Labor's mass migration agenda, which is applying pressure to housing, to infrastructure, to services. Then I was further pursued on this line of talking.
"What I did was point out the fact that, yes, Indian migrants are the second-largest migrant group to this country, and soon to be the largest migrant group to this country. A recent Redbridge poll told us that 85 per cent of those who have Indian ancestry – and that's my children included by the way — 85 per cent voted for Labor ... So, these were the facts that I was pointing out."
A transcript of ABC's Afternoon Briefing shows Senator Price raised the claim after host Patricia Karvelas asked whether citizens were more concerned about the core number — or the type of migrants — that are coming to Australia.
Senator Price responded by singling out Indian migrants, who were also targeted at Sunday's protests.
"It is definitely the core number. And of course, there is focus from this government to be getting them from particular countries over others," she said.
"I think Labor like to be able to ensure that they're going to allow those in that would ultimately support their policies, their views, and vote for them as well."
Asked to clarify if she meant Labor was running a migration program to bring in people sympathetic to its policies, Senator Price said: "absolutely".
Pressed twice on her claims, she first said: "Those that are more Labor leaning." The second time, she added, "As we have seen, you yourself mentioned, that there is a concern with the Indian community...there's been large numbers and we can see that reflected in the way the community votes for Labor at the same time."
Opposition Leader Sussan Ley rejected the claim, insisting Australia's migration program is "non-discriminatory".
"It doesn't matter how you vote, we're here for everyone because we know that the values of the Liberal Party; aspiration, hard work, reward for effort and building this community in this country are something that will resonate in a serious, credible, compelling agenda," Ms Ley told Sky News.
Anti-immigration rallies "weren't necessarily protests"
Turning to Sunday's rallies — which included neo-Nazis violently attacking Camp Sovereignty in Naarm, along with footage of racist signs and anti-immigrant slogans — Senator Price said: "they weren't necessarily protests," but rather a "pro-Australia march".
"For so long, Australians who are proud to call themselves Australian have been under attack — particularly by the left — and have been told that we are a racist country. And this has been brewing for some time," she said.
"And what happened was, the quiet Australians came out and decided to be loud."
Senator Price added she saw "some beautiful footage of members of the migrant community standing with white Australians," which she described as "a demonstration of unity".
By contrast, she accused the "far left" of burning the Australian flag. "That to me is the division," she said.
"What occurred on Sunday was about unifying this country. And I know that many of those quiet Australians, that's what they wanted to be known for, not division."
The NT Senator also continued her criticisms of the Greens and revisited her clash in the Senate earlier this week, when she was asked to remove the Australian flag she had draped around her shoulders.
"You know that the Greens often say, 'we have to pay our respects and acknowledge First Nations Australians'. Now, I don't call myself a 'First Nations Australian' because that title has been adopted from other countries," she said.
"But I call myself an Australian — one of Indigenous heritage in this country. And I found it deeply insulting that Senator McKim and Sarah Hanson-Young found it quite funny to ask me to remove the Australian flag from my shoulders as I was speaking about it on our nation's flag day. I should not have been subjected to this. I don't think any senator should be subjected to this."
