One Nation’s Victorian leader has previously said mass deportations in Australia are “not a reality” and “won’t happen”, in newly unearthed comments which raise further questions about Pauline Hanson’s signature policy to deport ۷۵,۰۰۰ people she says have overstayed visas.
Warren Pickering, on Monday unveiled as the party’s leader for Victoria’s November state election, also previously conceded in niche podcast interviews that the party ran so-called “ghost candidates” who didn’t actively campaign in order to harvest more Senate votes.
Pickering, whose party’s federal leader Hanson is aged ۷۲, also suggested politicians over age ۵۵ were no longer the “finger on the pulse demographic” and should “handball it to the next generation”.
“People have had a gutful of these dinosaurs, these ۷۰-year-old elites in the major political parties that are still pulling the strings,” Pickering told the Carly Unfiltered podcast in April ۲۰۲۵.
Pickering, a former federal Senate candidate for One Nation and the party’s state president, will run for the ultra-marginal seat of Pakenham.
In comments which raise further questions about One Nation’s federal immigration policy, Pickering told another podcast in April ۲۰۲۵ that while he supported the party’s goals to “abolish multiculturalism” and deport ۷۵,۰۰۰ people, he believed mass deportations would not occur.
“I’ve heard people talk about remigration and and things like that,” Pickering told conservative podcast WilmsFront, connected to rightwing nationalist website The Unshackled.
The host interjected “mass deportations”, to which Pickering responded: “Look, it’s just not a reality.
“You’re not going to see it in any western country. You can advocate for it all you like, but it won’t happen,” he said.
“The reality is we don’t need to isolate those people, that are new Australians, from our communities. If you want them to ultimately to assimilate to the Australian culture and the Australian way of life, you can’t isolate them.”
Pickering went on to say One Nation would “not discriminate against people that are already Australian citizens”.
Hanson’s office and Pickering were contacted for comment and clarification of the party’s policy.
Guardian Australia last week revealed One Nation senator Malcolm Roberts has repeatedly advocated for “remigration” of international students and people overstaying visas. In one interview, Roberts said of visa overstayers: “That’s ۱۰۰,۰۰۰ we would deport, remigrate. Call it what you want.”
Asked in a recent Channel Seven interview about the concept of mass deportation, Hanson said: “I love it.” However One Nation has consistently declined to detail how it would enact such a policy.
In the same WilmsFront episode, and a separate ۲۰۲۲ interview with the podcast, Pickering admits One Nation ran some “ghost candidates” in election campaigns – which he described as “non-active candidates” – in a bid to boost its upper house votes. As Guardian Australia has reported, One Nation is known to run “ghost candidates” in many seats to secure the public funding entitlement. While these candidates are real people – usually taken from the party’s membership base – they are largely invisible on the hustings.
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“The more lower house representatives you can sport, the more likely you are to pick up Senate votes … we had quite a few electorates where for one reason or another, nobody either stepped forward or the person that stepped forward decided it was probably not worth them taking the time off work and coughing up the money to to potentially not get those funds back,” Pickering said in ۲۰۲۲.
The host said media described this tactic as “the ghost candidate”, to which Pickering replied: “This is what I’m alluding to.”
In the ۲۰۲۵ interview, Pickering claimed “most parties do run non-active candidates in certain seats”. He said while the party had grown its candidate ranks since the ۲۰۲۲ poll, they were “running as many physical candidates as we possibly can”.
“We do have a couple of seats that there isn’t an active candidate,” Pickering said in ۲۰۲۵, saying the tactic “ultimately it does helps us achieve our our upper house bid”.
During the Carly Unfiltered interview, in a discussion about social demographics, Pickering said older politicians should “handball” to younger representatives.
“I’m not saying you can’t add value, what I’m saying is that I think people need to get involved in politics a lot younger, carry the baton for a few years, and once you get to sort of that ۵۵ and above [age] it’s probably then time to start thinking about training the next generation, which we’ve had made a conscious effort to do at One Nation,” he said.
“We need people to get involved much younger, carry the baton for seven to ۱۰ years or whatnot, and then train up the next generation and hand it over before you fall outside of that demographic.”
Hanson is ۷۲ years old. Her Senate colleague Roberts is ۷۱, Barnaby Joyce is ۵۹ and newly elected David Farley is ۶۹. Hanson has been in the Senate since ۲۰۱۶, after first being elected to the lower house in ۱۹۹۶. Roberts was first elected to the Senate in ۲۰۱۶, and has served eight years after being disqualified partway through his first term then being re-elected in ۲۰۱۹. Joyce has served in parliament since ۲۰۰۵.
Pickering was among eight candidates unveiled by Hanson at a press conference on Monday. One Nation banned the ABC, the Age and the Guardian from attending the event, with Pickering threatening to sue media organisations that published “blatant character assassination attempts” of candidates.
While a press release initially said Pickering would lead the party’s upper house ticket in eastern Victoria, it was later confirmed the position will be filled by Greg Hansford, who ran for One Nation at the ۲۰۲۵ federal election.
Hansford stood at the ۲۰۲۲ federal election in May for One Nation and at the state election in November for the Freedom party, which ran on an anti-lockdown and anti-vaccine mandate platform.
