By james art Ms Faruqi sued Ms Hanson in the Federal Circuit Court in 2022 on social media platform X, then called Twitter, under a provision of the Racial Discrimination Act that prohibits public actions and statements that offend, insult, humiliate or intimidate people because of their race, color, or national or ethnic origin.
Following the news that Queen Elizabeth II had died, Ms Farooqui, deputy leader of Australia’s Green Party, posted: “I cannot mourn the leader of a racist empire built on the stolen lives, land and wealth of colonized peoples.”
The 70-year-old leader of Pauline Hanson’s One Nation party responded that Ms Faruqi had immigrated to “take advantage” of Australia and told the Lahore-born Muslim to return to Pakistan, using an expletive.
Ms Hanson has been known for her views on race since her first speech to Parliament in 1996, in which she warned that Australia was “at risk of being overrun by Asians” because of the nation’s non-discriminatory immigration policy.
She once wore a burqa to the Senate as part of a campaign to ban Islamic face coverings.
Ms Faruqi, a 61-year-old qualified engineer, moved to Australia with her husband in 1992 as skilled economic migrants.
Judge Angus Stewart found that Henson had engaged in “seriously offensive” and intimidating behaviour.
The post is racist, nativist and anti-Muslim, he said.
“This is a strong form of racism,” he said.
The judge ordered Ms Hanson to delete the offending post and pay MS Faruqi’s legal costs. He said he expects those costs to “amount to a fairly significant amount.”
Ms Faruqi hailed the decision as rehabilitation for “every single person who was told to go back to where they came from. And believe me, there are too many of us who have been subjected to this extreme racist slur, too many times in this country”.
“Today’s decision tells us that telling someone to go back to where they came from is a strong form of racism,” she told reporters.
“Today is a good day for people of color, for Muslims and all of us who have worked so hard to build an anti-racist society,” she said.
Hanson said she was “deeply disappointed” by the decision and would appeal.
The sentence demonstrates an “inappropriately broad application” of the section of the Racial Discrimination Act she violated, particularly in terms of how that section affects freedom of political expression, Ms. Hanson said in a statement.
Her lawyers argued that her post was exempt from the law because of the constitutionally implied freedom of political communication.
Ms Hanson said she considered the Queen’s death a matter of public interest and that Ms Faruqi’s views on the death were also a matter of public interest.
The judge found that Ms Hanson’s tweet did not address any of the points made in Faruqi’s tweet.
“Senator Hanson’s tweet was simply an angry ad hominem attack devoid of discernible content (or commentary) in response to what Senator Faruqi said,” he wrote in his ruling.
He described Ms Hanson’s evidence as “generally unreliable”, rejecting her claim that she did not know Ms Faruqi’s religion when she posted.
Ms Hanson told the court she had called for a ban on Muslim immigration in the past, but she described this as her personal opinion and not the policy of her minor party.
She admitted that she once said in a media interview that she would not sell her house to a Muslim, but declined to say whether she meant what she said.