![\"Brittany](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/1768905264_300_af71def990bb09f8d3ae9269dff8c75c2d45963c.png\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Updated June 11, 2026 \u2014 5:20pm,first published 4:09pm<\/p>\n
Save<\/p>\n
You have reached your maximum number of saved items.<\/p>\n
Remove items from your saved list<\/a> to add more.<\/p>\n AAA<\/p>\n Labor\u2019s decision to delay political donation reforms has inadvertently handed One Nation an extra six months to court high-rolling donors as the minor party claims to have raised more than $2 million in less than two days through their campaign attacking the prime minister.<\/p>\n One Nation will have the rest of the year to capitalise on its newfound popularity and lobby for unlimited donations and gifts \u2013 such as the private plane donated last month by Australia\u2019s richest person<\/a>, mining billionaire Gina Rinehart \u2013 before a yearly cap of $50,000 per donor is introduced for federal cash donations and another $50,000 for gifts.<\/p>\n The public will not learn the details about Pauline Hanson\u2019s millions in donations for this financial year, including the \u201cFire the Liar\u201d campaign, until the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) publishes campaign donation data on February 1.<\/p>\n That process will also be overhauled so that from next year, donations are made public within three weeks, or daily in the week before an election. Parties will need to declare donations made in the last half of this year by early 2027.<\/p>\n The threshold for anonymous donations will be lowered from $17,300 to $5000.<\/p>\n The prime minister questioned the legitimacy of One Nation\u2019s fundraising claim on Thursday, while saying it paled in comparison to other donations and gifts Hanson has received from Rinehart.<\/p>\n \u201cDid she, though? What evidence is there?\u201d he said at a press conference in Sydney when asked about the money Hanson had accrued.<\/p>\n Related Article \u201cThis is someone who got a plane worth more than [those fundraising donations] given to her by Australia\u2019s richest person,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cThat pales in insignificance with the size of a single donation which was given, showing, I think, the interests that One Nation represent. It\u2019s not battlers \u2013 they vote against battlers each and every time.\u201d<\/p>\n Hanson\u2019s chief of staff James Ashby insisted all the donations were real and vowed to prove their legitimacy.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ll get the website independently audited by a forensics team, and they can actually give a stat dec to state that the website is real, the money\u2019s real,\u201d he told 2GB radio on Thursday.<\/p>\n He said 28,000 people had donated to the campaign, which would average close to $60 each.<\/p>\n One Nation launched the fundraiser on Wednesday morning in response to Labor\u2019s social media campaign appealing for donations of $27 to stop the rise of the minor party.<\/p>\n The Fire the Liar fundraising site suggests a donation of $60, but accepts any amount. Ashby pitched to listeners that anything under $1500 was tax-deductible ahead of the end of the financial year.<\/p>\n One Nation\u2019s fundraising efforts have escalated since the party started soaring in polls. <\/a> Former deputy prime minister Barnaby Joyce has defected to the party from the Nationals and has been courting wealthy benefactors with the help of Rinehart.<\/p>\n In April, the mining magnate hosted Hanson and Joyce for a fundraiser on her private plane, where guests paid $15,000 a head to dine in the air with the One Nation figures, according to The Australian Financial Review.<\/p>\n Hanson and Joyce also billed taxpayers more than $3000 to attend several fundraisers hosted by Rinehart on board the luxury cruise ship The World, The Guardian reported last week.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Alongside the private plane, worth an estimated $1.5 million, another $2 million was donated to One Nation<\/a> through Rinehart\u2019s friends and businesses in April.<\/p>\n Under the new donation rules, an individual or organisation will not be allowed to donate more than $1.6 million to multiple recipients in a year.<\/p>\n Hanson has publicly embraced her relationships with Rinehart and mining billionaire Clive Palmer after previously seeking to distance the party from claims it was being backed by Rinehart. \u201cI haven\u2019t seen any money from her,\u201d chief of staff \u00a0Ashby said in December<\/a>.<\/p>\n Before its recent polling success, Hanson became her own party\u2019s biggest donor by giving $245,000 in 2024-25, according to the latest AEC data.<\/p>\n She refused to reveal the source of the funds for what the party called a \u201ccommercial loan\u201d.<\/p>\n A government spokesperson said the six-month delay to the reforms was done only on the advice of the independent AEC to ensure the rules were enforceable from the moment they began.<\/p>\n \u201cThe sooner that Labor\u2019s reforms commence, the better for our democracy,\u201d they said.<\/p>\n \u201cUnder Labor\u2019s reforms, everything will be transparent and visible. The reforms, which include reasonable caps and limits, will finally put downward pressure on the big money that trades hands in elections, and make sure Australians know who is donating to parties and candidates before they go to the ballot box.\u201d<\/p>\n Nationals frontbencher Bridget McKenzie intervened in the debate on Thursday and said if the prime minister was going to suggest One Nation needed to provide evidence for its donations, Labor should also disclose which ministers received funds from the scandal-plagued CFMEU.<\/p>\n The federal government has been accused of trying to warp the system to benefit the major parties with its new donation laws and is facing a High Court challenge<\/a> from former independent politicians Zoe Daniel and Rex Patrick.<\/p>\n The pair is arguing the reforms could breach the Constitution\u2019s implied freedom of political communication by allowing the major parties to draw on more funding streams than independents because single donors can donate to multiple branches.<\/p>\n Cut through the noise of federal politics with news, views and expert analysis. Subscribers can sign up to our weekly Inside Politics newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n Save<\/p>\n You have reached your maximum number of saved items.<\/p>\n Remove items from your saved list<\/a> to add more.<\/p>\n![\"One](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/1fed9ef13ec1be9b4b85076c24298d902f91c89f.jpeg\")
One Nation leader Pauline Hanson has started a tour of Western Australia, where she is hosting a series of fundraisers.Alex Ellinghausen<\/p>\n![\"Pauline](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/6ecd27ea3e7d099cf30ae4d96399ae90efc6acda92bf88d8c55c06ecc9ede68b.jpeg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n
Hanson has been crisscrossing the country to appear at campaign-style fundraisers vowing to take seats from Labor ministers and eyeing off Coalition strongholds. The next election must be held by May 20, 2028 \u2013 almost two years away.<\/p>\n![\"Brittany](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/af71def990bb09f8d3ae9269dff8c75c2d45963c.png\")
Brittany Busch<\/a> is a federal politics reporter for The Age and Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via email<\/a>.From our partners<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Updated June 11, 2026 \u2014 5:20pm,first published 4:09pm Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":729986,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-729985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/729985","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=729985"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/729985\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/729986"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=729985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=729985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=729985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}