‘I’m not going to be salty’: Hanson-Young breaks silence on Greens’ leadership showdown

Sarah Hanson-Young has vowed to fight Pauline Hanson and the “radical right” after losing the Greens leadership contest, declaring progressive forces must unite to prevent One Nation from “wrecking this nation”.

The South Australian senator used her podcast to break her silence on last week’s bruising leadership contest, saying she had been disappointed to lose but would not be “salty” or allow the setback to hold her back.

Senator Sarah Hanson-Young says she’s not going to get “salty” over losing the Greens’ leadership contest.Glenn CampbellHer rallying cry was pointedly different from new leader David Shoebridge, who vowed last week to target the Albanese government and replace Labor at the next election.

“The challenge we have right now is to take on the radical right and to stop Pauline Hanson from wrecking this nation,” Hanson-Young said. “We’ve got a lot of work to do, and I know many of you, like me, are worried looking around at the state of politics and just going, ‘What the f--- is going on?’ I get it.”

Hanson-Young was one of two women, alongside Queensland senator Mehreen Faruqi, who unsuccessfully challenged Shoebridge for the leadership after Larissa Waters announced she would resign because of serious health concerns.

Shoebridge won the party-room ballot last Wednesday, seven votes to four, with Faruqi subsequently stepping down as deputy leader.

Hanson-Young, who was eliminated in the first round with just two votes, said she nominated because she wanted to offer “a vision for progressive Australia that was optimistic, caring, and defiant”.

“As it turned out, I didn’t get the leadership and, yeah, I was disappointed about that,” she said in her podcast. “But I’m not going to be salty, and I’m not going to let it hold me back.”

Her comments came as divisions within the Greens continued to surface over the contest and the role played by Waters in determining its outcome.

News.com.au reported on Monday that Waters told Hanson-Young on the day of the ballot that she was backing Shoebridge. According to the report, colleagues claimed Hanson-Young complained Waters should support a female candidate and argued the “sisterhood” did not exist.

Party insiders cited by the publication claimed Waters’ support for Shoebridge was decisive in preventing either Hanson-Young or Faruqi from winning.

Hanson-Young has declined to comment on the reported conversation.

In her podcast, however, Hanson-Young made clear she intended to turn her attention beyond the leadership contest and towards One Nation and the broader political right.

“The radical right around the world have been on the march, and they’ve got to Australia,” she said. “There’s no point just throwing our hands up in the air and going ‘What the f---?’ We actually have to stop them from wrecking things.”

She accused One Nation of seeking to divide Australians and attacked mining billionaire Gina Rinehart’s financial support for the party.

“We’re not going to be bought, are we? We’re not going to let our country be bought,” she said.

The senator also linked the rise of the right to debates over climate change, women’s rights and immigration, and said progressive parties needed to overcome their own divisions.

“Progressive Australia has got to stop being divided,” she said. “We might not all agree on exactly how to fix things, but we can all agree that the right, the rabid, nasty, ugly right forces in this country, need to be stopped before they wreck things that are irreplaceable, before they destroy the soul of the nation.”

Hanson-Young and colleague David Shoebridge in 2025. Shoebridge is the Greens’ new leader.Alex EllinghausenHanson last week insisted the Greens “don’t care” about Australia and that voters were going to stop supporting them.

“I rarely ever hear them standing up fighting for the ordinary average Australian out there and it’s a real shame,” the One Nation leader told News24, formerly Sky News Australia.

Hanson-Young ended her podcast with a call to supporters to remain engaged despite her leadership defeat.

“We have to come together and stare down these arseholes,” she said. “I tell you what: I’m not going to be letting the bastards get me down, and neither are you. Come on, we’ve got to fight for our country.”

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese last week cautioned the new Greens leadership team over its vow to supplant Labor, arguing the same strategy cost the minor party three lower house seats at last year’s federal election.

Since the vote, Shoebridge has bowed to calls from rank and file party members, including former MP Max Chandler-Mather, to give them a say in the next leadership election, which is due to take place immediately after the next federal election.

A party plebiscite in 2020 resulted in 62 per cent of Greens members supporting a party-wide vote for leader, but fell short of a required two-thirds majority.

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