2 weeks Ago By Paul Sakkal
View full election results Opposition Leader Peter Dutton says there is a parallel between the voters who rejected the Democrats in the US presidential election and Australians angry about the cost of living, as he seeks to tie Anthony Albanese’s record on inflation and immigration to Kamala Harris’ defeat. “Part of the problem in the United States was that people didn’t believe that the government was listening to them when they couldn’t pay their bills,” Dutton said on Nine’s Today show on Friday. US President-elect Donald Trump and Opposition Leader Peter Dutton.
Credit: AP, Alex Ellinghausen “They just felt a real disconnect ...
To be honest, there’s an eerie parallel with what’s happening here in Australia.” “The migration issues there were very real in the election and I think they’re going to be real in the upcoming election here because this is just a disaster.” While Dutton’s conservative instincts align with some of the Republican playbook, his political track record suggests he will avoid the excesses of Trump’s rhetoric and attacks on institutions, even if Dutton’s Australia-first stance opens him up to claims of populism.
The opposition leader is already using the Trump victory to reinforce his messages on the economy and immigration, Coalition MPs are debating whether the Republican’s anti-elite focus could work in the Australian election, which must be held by May next year. The mood was buoyant at a pre-scheduled Coalition drinks event in the office of the party’s chief whip on Wednesday night in Canberra, at which some staffers wore red ties to support the Republican Party. There is consensus in the Coalition that the US result proves how hard it is for ruling parties to convince voters of economic credentials after years of elevated prices, but that unity does not extend to all opposition MPs being keen to take on more strident anti-woke rhetoric and policy.
A day before the US result, Dutton showed colleagues he wanted to avoid being dragged into fringe issues when he ordered the joint party room to ditch a push for a national debate on abortion..
