Neo-Nazis who rallied in Sydney want to enter NSW politics
“This is not up to me specifically, obviously the electoral commission has a role in registering political parties and we need to investigate whether this violates hate speech laws and laws designed to stop political apartheid and hatred in our society,” he said.
If NSN is successful in registering a political party in NSW, they hope to emulate the upper house campaigns run by smaller parties such as the NSW Libertarians. Davis singled out MP John Ruddick as an example of a strategy neo-Nazis could emulate; and NSN supporters often targeted Ruddick as a potential ally.
Ruddick said he disagreed with the NSN’s views but supported their right to form a party.
“We don’t live in a liberal democracy if people can’t form political parties. We have a political party since Federation, Fraser Anning’s Conservative National Party, which has pursued a similar agenda as the NSN and they got half a per cent of the vote,” Ruddick said.
Ruddick said any effort to ban the NSN, the White Australia Party or Nazi slogans would lead the organization to go underground or find new ways to espouse its views.
Jack Eltis, the neo-Nazi who filed paperwork for the NSW Police ahead of Saturday’s rally, has been giving seminars to his fellow white supremacists on how to highlight their message. He described a potential political party as a way to gain legal protection and fundraise for the NSN.
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While most mainstream parties ask their members to attend branch meetings and volunteer in elections, the NSN requires its members to follow “routines and rituals”, including a physical training regime in which they are encouraged to meet certain fitness standards.
Last month, Australian Federal Police Acting Commissioner Nigel Ryan said the AFP was setting up new national security investigation teams to focus on groups such as the NSN, according to Senate estimates, and that he was concerned about the possibility of the group forming a political party.
ASIO chief executive Mike Burgess last week warned of NSN efforts to enter the political mainstream.
“Even if the organization is not involved in terrorism, I am deeply concerned by its hateful, divisive rhetoric and increasingly violent propaganda, and the increasing likelihood that these will lead to spontaneous violence, especially in response to perceived provocation,” he said in a speech at the Lowy Institute.
NSN is not listed as a proscribed terrorist group in Australia, despite its extreme anti-immigrant ideology. Following an investigation in 2021 reporter And Age Former NSW premier and Labor senator reveals how neo-Nazis thrive in Australian suburbs Kristina Keneally called for the group to be banned.
“The ban is also there to send a loud and clear message about what Australia values and rejects,” he wrote. reporter.
A federal government spokesman said the government was listening to the agencies’ recommendations but would not discuss operational matters, including the potential listing of any groups.
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