Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has unleashed on ABC star Sarah Ferguson after she was asked if she was the reason the Coalition lost.
The Shadow Minister for Indigenous Australians made a major gaffe during the campaign when she promised to ‘Make Australia Great Again’ – just as Peter Dutton was trying to distance himself as much as he could from Donald Trump.
‘Jacinta, Peter Dutton has lost his seat,’ Ferguson said on Saturday night.
‘With your embrace of Donald Trump, Make Australia Great Again, are you part of that loss?’
A seething Senator Price, who was surrounded by four stern-looking men including her husband, Colin Lillie, immediately blamed Labor for capitalising on her mistake.
‘If you swing enough mud in an election, it sticks,’ she responded.
‘We did see a Prime Minister who absolutely mislead the Australian people all the way through and was rarely called out for his conduct. I think it is deceitful.’
Ferguson and Senator Price then proceeded to talk over one another in a heated exchange, before the ABC host pleaded: ‘Let’s just talk about this sensibly, Jacinta.’
Jacinta Nampijinpa Price (pictured) has unleashed on ABC star Sarah Ferguson after she was asked if she was the reason the Coalition lost
The Shadow Minister for Indigenous Australians made a major gaffe during the campaign when she promised to ‘Make Australia Great Again’ – just as Peter Dutton was trying to distance himself as much as he could from Donald Trump
Senator Price vented her frustration before insisting Trump did not own the copyright on making things great again.
‘Can I just say, in terms of wanting this country to be great: Donald Trump doesn’t own those four words,’ Senator Price said.
‘The media can go through your personal Facebook photos, and find a picture that was taken, in jest, at Christmas time, and then smear you with it, that is the problem.’
She is, of course, referring to a picture of her wearing a MAGA hat alongside a man in a MAGA Santa hat, which emerged after her ‘Make Australia Great Again’ gaffe.
She made the gaffe at a bowling club in Perth on April 12, just as the Coalition was trying to distance itself from the American leader in the wake of his imposition of tariffs on Australia.
Senator Price was introducing Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, who was also at the luncheon, when she evoked the polarising US President.
‘[The Liberal party will] ensure that we can make Australia great again, that we can bring Australia back to its former glory, that we can get Australia back on track,’ she said.
Her words were immediately seized on by Labor, and the comment was widely reported.
‘The media can go through your personal Facebook photos, and find a picture that was taken, in jest, at Christmas time, and then smear you with it, that is the problem,’ Senator Price said on Saturday night (pictured: the photo in question)
Labor’s campaign spokesperson Jason Clare said the Coalition ‘just want to import US polices and US slogans to Australia’.
Senator Price’s accusations of mud-slinging echoed comments made by Michaelia Cash as the recriminations in the Liberal camp begin in earnest.
‘I have to say, the online campaign by Labor and the Greens against Peter Dutton was probably the most disgusting I have ever seen,’ Senator Cash told Channel Seven
‘And I think that has resonated with people.’
It has been a disastrous night for the Coalition, with leader Peter Dutton set to lose his own seat.
Former journalist Ali France is on track to win Dutton’s seat of Dickson with early analysis projection a ‘probable’ win for the Labor candidate.
Dutton had been trailing France since the first ballot boxes started to be counted but had been hoping that he would secure a bounce once the pre-poll votes began to drop about 8.30pm.