{"id":825854,"date":"2026-07-26T23:54:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-26T23:54:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/825854\/"},"modified":"2026-07-26T23:54:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-26T23:54:10","slug":"get-rid-of-them-one-nation-senator-claims-party-will-remigrate-illegal-visa-holders-in-resurfaced-interview-one-nation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/825854\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Get rid of them\u2019: One Nation senator claims party will \u2018remigrate\u2019 illegal visa holders in resurfaced interview | One Nation"},"content":{"rendered":"

Senator Malcolm Roberts<\/a> claims One Nation wants to deport at least 200,000 people and has repeatedly referred to the far-right concept of \u201cremigration\u201d in podcast interviews and speeches to niche platforms.<\/p>\n

In two recent podcasts, Roberts said One Nation<\/a> wanted to deport 100,000 temporary residents as well as 100,000 international students \u2013 a total much higher than the party\u2019s published policy. The senator said after those people were removed, he wanted to \u201cstart working on the higher numbers of people we need to get rid of\u201d.<\/p>\n

One Nation\u2019s policy website states the party would seek to \u201cdeport 75,000 illegal migrants\u201d, specifically noting \u201cvisa overstayers, illegal workers, and unlawful non-residents\u201d. The website also pledges to \u201cend the student visa loopholes that turn study into a backdoor to permanent residency or low-wage labour\u201d.<\/p>\n

But Roberts, in an interview with the 2 Worlds Collide podcast in November 2025, suggested One Nation wanted to deport or \u201cremigrate\u201d a far higher number.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe would also deport immediately anybody who\u2019s here illegally, and that\u2019s 100,000 people now \u2026 on contravention of their resident visas. That\u2019s 100,000 we would deport, remigrate. Call it what you want. Get rid of them straight away,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen we\u2019ve got about an estimated 100,000 international students who are here illegally. They\u2019ve either graduated and not gone home or they\u2019ve breached their legal visa. So we would send them home.\u201d<\/p>\n

In another interview with podcaster Brodie Buchal, published in June, Roberts repeated those sentiments.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have 100,000 people here on temporary resident visas illegally. We would deport them, remigrate them, send them home,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got 100,000 students who are here illegally, and we suspect it\u2019s much, much more. Send them home.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019d tighten the entry requirements, remigrate, deport, and then start working on the higher numbers of people we need to get rid of.\u201d<\/p>\n

One Nation was contacted for comment and clarification of its deportation policy.<\/p>\n

One Nation\u2019s hardline immigration policy has come under renewed scrutiny after Pauline Hanson\u2019s appearance on Channel 7\u2019s Spotlight program<\/a>, where she met Rupert Lowe, leader of hard-right party Restore Britain. Lowe gave her a pamphlet titled \u201cmass deportations\u201d and Hanson replied they were \u201con the same page\u201d.<\/p>\n

Seven reporter Liam Bartlett asked Hanson whether she thought \u201cthis concept of mass deportation is a good one?\u201d She replied: \u201cI love it.\u201d<\/p>\n

However One Nation has consistently declined to detail how it would enact such a policy. MP Barnaby Joyce on Monday said people would be deported<\/a> \u201cas it becomes apparent that they\u2019re not supposed to be here\u201d, including \u201cas people present themselves for medical issues\u201d.<\/p>\n

Abul Rizvi, former deputy secretary of the immigration department, said it would be \u201ceye-wateringly expensive\u201d for a system to deport such numbers of people from Australia, or a Trump-style mass deportation operation like the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). He said recent figures showed only about 2,000 people were apprehended, detained and deported from Australia last year, with another 6,000 voluntarily leaving.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt would cost a fortune and unless you did it carefully, it would result in massive errors and all sorts of problems,\u201d Rizvi said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is a sensible policy in this space to be developed, but you need to do it in a careful, well-targeted way that doesn\u2019t increase in huge errors, huge numbers of people detained and clogging up court systems.\u201d<\/p>\n

Roberts\u2019 recent comments have also repeatedly referenced \u201cremigration\u201d. The term has featured in Trump administration immigration policies, including an \u201coffice of remigration\u201d to oversee deportations<\/a> and \u201cvoluntary return of migrants\u201d \u2013 Trump himself tweeted about his plan to return \u201cillegal migrants to their home countries (also known as remigration)\u201d.<\/p>\n

But remigration has also become a buzzword for the global far right<\/a>. The Global Project Against Hate and Extremism described<\/a> remigration as \u201ca white supremacist policy concept that calls for the forced removal of immigrants, refugees, and their descendants \u2014 including legal residents and citizens \u2014 based on race, ethnicity, culture, being perceived as \u2018non-white,\u2019 or a failure to \u2018assimilate\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

One Nation was contacted for comment regarding Roberts\u2019 understanding of the term.<\/p>\n

In addition to mentioning \u201cremigration\u201d on the 2 Worlds Collide and Brodie Buchal podcasts, Roberts also advocated for it during a speech to a conference organised by conservative campaign group Firebrand. Photos from that conference, posted to social media<\/a>, show Hanson was also in attendance.<\/p>\n

The conference host, welcoming Roberts onto the stage, praised him as \u201cone of the only MPs yet to mention the magical, unmentionable word \u2018remigration\u2019\u201d.<\/p>\n

In his address, Roberts said: \u201cRemigration is the second part of my my speech. Take the people who are not fitting in or that we don\u2019t need and send them home.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to put Australia first. Stop immigration, deport people, remigrate.\u201d<\/p>\n

In that speech, Roberts said he was \u201copposed to mass immigration, the swamping of our culture\u201d but was \u201cnot opposed to immigrants\u201d.<\/p>\n

Roberts\u2019 speech was praised by a white supremacist news outlet, The Noticer. The outlet said \u201cremigration\u201d had been popularised by German and Austrian far-right parties and activists, who frame the term as meaning the mass removal of non-white citizens.<\/p>\n

Dr Kurt Sengul, a research fellow at Macquarie University who studies far-right ideology, called remigration \u201can extreme and dangerous\u201d position.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s important to note that remigration refers to the forced repatriation of all non-white people, not just so-called illegal or undocumented migrants or reducing \u2018mass migration\u2019. It\u2019s an extreme position rooted in ethnic cleansing and white supremacy,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Asked if he thought there was any other way to interpret the term \u201cremigration\u201d in this context, Sengul said no.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think there is any other way to see it; there\u2019s not a friendlier or more moderate version of remigration \u2026 it sends a powerful signal to far-right activists that One Nation are embracing the term,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Senator Malcolm Roberts claims One Nation wants to deport at least 200,000 people and has repeatedly referred to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":825855,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-825854","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\/825854","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=825854"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/825854\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/825855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=825854"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=825854"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=825854"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}