Anthony Albanese has called for a respectful debate for the rest of the Voice to Parliament campaign in the wake of a "quite horrific" neo-Nazi flag-burning video threatening prominent Indigenous "no" campaigner Lidia Thorpe and the Australian government.
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The Australian Federal Police is investigating the threats and the video has been removed from the X social media platform, but the independent senator has responded by denouncing the October 14 referendum as an "act of genocide" against Indigenous people and has stated that the Prime Minister had failed to protect her.
"Where is my support, where is my protection in this country?" she told reporters in Melbourne.
With just over a week to go before referendum day and more than 1 million early votes already cast, the intensity of the campaign has markedly stepped up.
TV legend Ray Martin has also been caught up in conflated confusion about how he described the "no" slogan of "don't know, vote 'no'" at a "yes" event as being about capturing "dinosaurs or d***heads." He said he was not describing "no" voters and won't apologise.
Amid other reports of verbal abuse at polling stations and continued abuse and misinformation online, the Prime Minister has called for calm.
"I think people need to be respectful during this debate. It is important that people are respectful with each other," Mr Albanese told reporters in Brisbane, before launching into the "quite horrific" video.
"I've seen the video that was referred to that is threatening towards Senator Thorpe and towards the government and the sort of Nazi rhetoric and statements that are in that video have no place in discourse in Australian political life."
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The video, posted earlier this week to X and tagged to Senator Thorpe's account, showed a masked man with a distorted voice, referring to the Victorian Senator and the government before burning the Aboriginal flag and performing a Nazi salute.
The Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has described it as "completely unhinged and unacceptable", while the Home Affairs Minister Clare O'Neil called it "disgusting" and Senator Thorpe's former Greens leader Adam Bandt called it a "hate attack" and said more resources were needed to protect politicians and other public figures.
Mr Dutton also blamed the Prime Minister.
"I'm really worried at the moment, because, as we know, the Prime Minister's got us embarked on a path which divides our country," he said without mentioning the opposition's decision to oppose the Voice.
"You're talking about family members against family members, communities against communities, and it gives rise in this sort of an environment to radical lunatics to make comments like they've made in relation to Senator Thorpe."
The AFP is investigating the threats. After the video was removed, the account that posted the video was then deactivated.
Mr Albanese said he could not go into security details, but said Senator Thorpe had come to him on the same day he spoke to the AFP.
"Senator Thorpe certainly responded to me that same day by thanking me for responding to her," he said.
Senator Thorpe, at a press statement in Melbourne, accused the Prime Minister of wanting to "shut me down" over the referendum and revealed she had been unable to live in her own home for four months.
"The referendum is an act of genocide against my people. And the Prime Minister knows exactly what he's doing," she said.
"His violent force that he has sent to protect me can't even protect me, refuse to protect the black sovereign woman because the police are part of the problem in this country.
"You want to paint me as an angry black woman, well you are about to see an angry black woman."
The Opposition Leader is calling for Ray Martin to apologise for remarks at a "yes" event, calling out the "no" slogan "If you don't know, vote 'no'"' as catering to "dinosaurs or d***heads." The Prime Minister was the event and heard the presentation.
Mr Dutton accused the Prime Minister of talking out of "both sides of his mouth."
"This is a Prime Minister who's dividing the country and Mr Martin's comments are offensive to millions of Australians," he told reporters in Perth.
Mr Martin is unrepentant. "Condemn me for what I said, but not what I didn't say," the veteran journalist and TV presenter told 6PR radio.
"I was talking about the slogan that said 'If you don't know, vote 'no'," he said. "That's one of the stupidest slogans I've heard in my life. It's also an endorsement of ignorance."
Indigenous leader Noel Pearson has also accused the Opposition Leader of "rewriting history", rejecting Mr Dutton's assessment as false that the Prime Minister had not watered down the Voice proposal as "Alan Joyce and others" has told him not to.
"This is entirely our proposal. It is just that the current government, Labor, did what the previous government hesitated about for too long," Mr Pearson said while campaigning in Brisbane.
Anthony Albanese says people have "nothing to fear" from a successful Voice as parliamentary processes will still be the same.
"Fear can be a powerful emotion, but no nation ever advanced by being promoted or motivated by fear," he told Channel 10. "What advances a nation and brings us together is hope and optimism and support for our fellow Australians."