Pauline Hanson has made a career of pushing the boundaries in order to grab a headline.
Whether it is meeting with rightwinger Tommy Robinson, shifting the blame for domestic violence rates on to women, or praising Vladimir Putin, Hanson is always happy to take the low road.
Her political comeback tour of 2026 has given us the same Hanson; she is, as she says, consistent.
But this year has brought with it a new dynamic that has enabled her rise.
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Gina Rinehart’s patronage has buttressed Hanson’s resurgence, with the rightwing billionaire tipping in what appears to be near-unlimited funds to realise her dream of importing Trumpism into Australia.
Rinehart’s backing was also key to bringing Barnaby Joyce across to One Nation – a critical element of giving Hanson mainstream credibility.
At the same time, the political establishment has largely chosen to pretend Hanson’s revival tour isn’t happening – sticking to the conclusions of focus groups that advise not to criticise Hanson directly.
The logic goes that taking on Hanson feeds her victim narrative and galvanises her support base.
But the strategy to vacate the field has been the background to the tripling of Hanson’s primary support in opinion polls and now sees her as preferred prime minister.
Nowhere has the absence of criticism being more apparent than within the Liberal and National parties, despite a few notable exceptions. Many on the right side of politics decided the best way to try to win back their bleeding support base was to cheer on the party from the sidelines, or to mimic it.
This has seen the Liberal party focus on the concerns of its most rightwing voters – many of whom have switched to One Nation and are not for conversion – with the added bonus of validating Hanson’s party platform.
Tony Abbott and Peta Credlin have been chief among these cheerleaders, although Basil Zempilas, the Western Australian state Liberal leader, must get special mention for the leadership that handed One Nation a seat in state parliament.
Hanson herself even thanked Zempilas on election night for delivering her the result, praising him as a “man of vision and common sense”.
This week, Andrew Hastie chose to draw a line, pulling Hanson up on her decision to publish a cartoon that called him a traitor eight times.
“When you start calling me a traitor to my own country, then we have a big, big problem,” said Hastie, a Special Air Service veteran who served three tours in the Middle East.
The targeting of Hastie for giving evidence in the failed defamation trial of Ben Roberts-Smith has been coordinated and relentless. It is backed by a powerful nexus of influence that is most acutely felt in WA.
One Nation’s campaign against Hastie is directly linked to the position of Rinehart, who, as a result of her personal connections to backers of Roberts-Smith, has been one of the most strident critics of Hastie.
She privately calls him “the traitor” and has poured money into a legal fund designed to defend special forces personnel in legal matters.
This year, Rinehart even bankrolled new beachside veteran accommodation in Perth named in Roberts-Smith’s honour, even while he remains on bail facing criminal charges.
Roberts-Smith is accused of murdering or ordering the murders of five unarmed detainees while deployed in Afghanistan between 2009 and 2012. He has consistently and vigorously denied the allegations against him.
Not only is Hastie up against the power and money of Rinehart, who now has a megaphone in Hanson’s political party, but also the power, money and influence of Kerry Stokes – another key supporter of Roberts-Smith who has a stranglehold on WA’s mainstream media that has published countless hit pieces on the member for Canning.
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It’s an understatement to say Hastie is up against it.
Hanson’s attack on Hastie may have appealed to her wealthy patron and her rusted-on far-right support base, but it was more than a regular political jibe. It was an attack on a number of values and institutions that democratically minded Australians, and certainly true conservatives, hold dear.
Hastie’s intervention was not just taking a stand to defend himself from the slanderous accusation of treachery.
It was taking a stand on the importance of the separation of powers, the rule of law, the right to a fair trial, testimony under oath, and the professional standards of the Australian Defence Force.
Hastie was backed up by fellow veteran firebrand Jacqui Lambie, the WA One Nation leader, Rod Caddies, the Returned Services League, and even Barnaby Joyce, who remains an uncomfortable bedfellow for Hanson.
The One Nation leader herself was unrepentant, but was also clearly caught off-guard by Hastie’s moral clarity.
Hanson denied calling him a traitor despite being a co-producer and the authoriser of the cartoon on her site, and refused to apologise.
Hastie’s intervention is a reminder that Hanson remains a fringe player by instinct who thinks the rules don’t apply to her because, so often, they don’t.
Hanson has defended rapists, criminals and drug addicts when politically convenient, and yet has been willing to attack a traditional Christian conservative like Hastie because it suits an element of her base and her wealthy billionaire backer.
For Hanson to be a genuine political force capable of taking power, she needs to expand the appeal of her party to the centre, capturing the traditional Liberal and National voters who feel disillusioned with the major parties.
Hastie, who has leadership ambitions, has shown that there is an alternative to the courtship and kowtowing to One Nation.
Will the rest of the party now put up a fight?
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Sarah Martin is senior correspondent for Guardian Australia
