{"id":639215,"date":"2026-10-23T17:34:14","date_gmt":"2026-10-23T17:34:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/639215\/"},"modified":"2026-10-23T17:34:14","modified_gmt":"2026-10-23T17:34:14","slug":"kerrin-leoni-breaks-silence-on-resignation-says-whanau-turned-into-political-weapon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/639215\/","title":{"rendered":"Kerrin Leoni breaks silence on resignation, says wh\u0101nau turned into ‘political weapon’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kerrin Leoni says she quit as a Labour candidate to stop the controversy surrounding her association with the Mongrel Mob being used as a “political weapon” to help National win the election.<\/p>\n

In her first public comments since resigning, Leoni said the intense focus on her wh\u0101nau had become “increasingly difficult”.<\/p>\n

“I can handle the media scrutiny. I can handle the National Party attacking me. That comes with being in politics,” she wrote on Facebook on Friday afternoon.<\/p>\n

“What has become increasingly difficult is the intense focus on my wh\u0101nau and community.”<\/p>\n

Leoni resigned as Labour’s T\u0101maki Makaurau candidate on Friday morning<\/a>, after footage emerged of her campaigning alongside Mongrel Mob members at an event in early October.<\/p>\n

The video showed the former Auckland councillor encouraging those present to enrol to vote and change the government. A separate photograph showed her posing with people wearing Mongrel Mob regalia and making gang-related hand gestures.<\/p>\n

Labour candidate Kerrin Leoni resigns over gang campaigning<\/p>\n

Leoni said a “wh\u0101nau function”, attended by mokopuna, kaum\u0101tua, gang members and non-gang members had been turned into a “political weapon”, used for political gain and media clicks.<\/p>\n

“Is this really the kind of New Zealand we want to live in? Is this really the behaviour we want to model to our tamariki and mokopuna? Is this really how desperate some political leaders have become to cling onto power?”<\/p>\n

She said she had always tried to show her family members other opportunities in the hope they would choose a different path.<\/p>\n

“I cannot change who my wh\u0101nau are or who I grew up with, nor would I ever turn my back on them.”<\/p>\n

Leoni said she was proud to have represented Labour and stood by her apology to Labour leader Chris Hipkins: “I want everyone to know that I am okay. I will be back.”<\/p>\n

Earlier on Friday, Hipkins told reporters Leoni had displayed “very very bad judgement” and had paid a “very high price” for that.<\/p>\n

Both Hipkins and Leoni had earlier condemned Green and Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori MPs for visiting a gang pad this campaign<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Despite Leoni’s resignation, electoral law states that she will still appear on the ballot as a Labour candidate because nominations have already closed.<\/p>\n

‘What’s good for the goose is good for the gangster’<\/p>\n

National and ACT were both quick to seize on the past day’s developments, arguing they had revealed Labour’s true colours.<\/p>\n

National leader Christopher Luxon said the “chaotic situation” proved Labour could not be trusted when it came to law and order.<\/p>\n

“The Mongrel Mob clearly want them to be elected to power, because they know that they’re soft on crime,” he said.<\/p>\n

“Even their candidates think that’s okay to hang out with gang members and pal around. We don’t think it is.”<\/p>\n

Luxon said National was not open to engaging with gangs in any capacity: “I am not tolerant of gangs at all. I have no time for gangs.”<\/p>\n

He rejected Hipkins’ claim that there was a racist element to the response: “It’s a crime issue… not a race issue.”<\/p>\n

\"National<\/p>\n

National leader Christopher Luxon said the “chaotic situation” proved Labour could not be trusted when it came to law and order.<\/p>\n

RNZ \/ Lillian Hanly<\/p>\n

ACT leader David Seymour also came prepared to his daily media conference with a string of one-liners. He said the saga showed that the Labour did not truly believe that gangs were bad.<\/p>\n

“[Leoni] has revealed that what’s good for the goose is good for the gangster,” he said.<\/p>\n

“You’ve got a real possibility that the Labour Party is being funded by P money, and I don’t mean the artist from the 1990s.”<\/p>\n

Hipkins earlier said he had been assured that the function was not a fundraiser.<\/p>\n

NZ First leader Winston Peters struck a different tone from his coalition partners, saying his party would not be “gloating” or “salivating over somebody else’s misery”.<\/p>\n

“I’m trying to focus on the issues of those who are still on the ballot, not those who are not.”<\/p>\n

Peters stressed NZ First was “utterly opposed” to gangs and had no sympathy for the argument that they were the “victim of colonisation”.<\/p>\n

\"Hana<\/p>\n

Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori co-leader Rawiri Waititi accused the political right of exploiting the controversy.<\/p>\n

RNZ \/ Rachel Moore<\/p>\n

‘A sad day for M\u0101ori’<\/p>\n

In a separate social media post, senior M\u0101ori Labour MP Willie Jackson said the loss of Leoni as a candidate was a “real shame” but she “sadly made the wrong call”.<\/p>\n

“I want to congratulate Kerrin for her courage,” he wrote. “She did not want to get in the way of us trying to get rid of this rotten government, and she knew the Nats would come after her if she stayed a candidate.”<\/p>\n

Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori defended Leoni, with co-leader Rawiri Waititi describing her resignation as “a sad day for M\u0101ori”.<\/p>\n

“Our wh\u0101nau do not stop being our wh\u0101nau because they wear a patch, and our responsibility to them does not disappear because someone finds their presence politically inconvenient.”<\/p>\n

Waititi accused the political right of exploiting the controversy to divide parties seeking to replace the government.<\/p>\n

“The right benefits every time we turn on each other, and we will not give them that victory.”<\/p>\n

He urged voters to give their electorate vote to Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori and their party vote to Labour or the Greens.<\/p>\n

“We can disagree on how this has been handled without losing sight of what unites us. Our people cannot afford another three years of this Government.”<\/p>\n

Green co-leader Chloe Swarbrick declined to weigh in on the saga, saying she was focused on the issues that matter: “Most people are kind of sick and tired of this one.”<\/p>\n

Former M\u0101ori Party co-leader and minister Te Ururoa Flavell said Leoni’s resignation was inevitable because she was not honest with Labour leadership.<\/p>\n

“Saying one thing and doing another was probably the biggest sin,” he told RNZ’s Checkpoint. “Mr Hipkins probably didn’t have too many choices on the back of that.”<\/p>\n

Flavell said meeting people from all walks of life, including gang members, was part of an MP’s job.<\/p>\n

“To put a line in the sand and say you cannot go and talk to somebody about voting, for goodness sake, seems way out of order.”<\/p>\n

He said politicians from both major parties had met gang members before, including former prime minister Rob Muldoon.<\/p>\n

Flavell said it was sad to see Leoni and Te P\u0101ti M\u0101ori MPs Oriini Kaipara and Hana-R\u0101whiti Maipi-Clarke “hammered” for their interactions with gangs.<\/p>\n

“Generally around election time, M\u0101ori tend to be the scapegoat on some of the issues that are raised and I think this is very close to that mark.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kerrin Leoni says she quit as a Labour candidate to stop the controversy surrounding her association with the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":639216,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-639215","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/639215","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=639215"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/639215\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/639216"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=639215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=639215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=639215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}