A volunteer at an early voting centre in Melbourne’s southeast has been attacked by a member of the public in an incident captured on video.
The footage, originally shared on social media by political commentator Rukshan Fernando and later reposted by Senator Ralph Babet, shows a man wearing a bicycle helmet approaching a volunteer outside the Uniting Church voting booth in Pakenham.
In the video, the man appears to knee and punch the volunteer, who was wearing a yellow shirt and handing out vote cards for Clive Palmer’s Trumpet of Patriots party.
“We were built on multiculturalism,” the man says during the confrontation. “These ads aren’t what Australia is about.”
The man also claims that polling booth volunteers had called him a “retard” after he alleged the Trumpet of Patriots team were racist.
“You are racist,” the man said.
Following the incident, Senator Babet, who entered parliament under Palmer’s now-deregistered United Australia Party, said the footage showed Australia was standing on the edge of political chaos.
“The left has spiralled into extremism, their actions increasingly aggressive and intolerant,” he said.
“They lack the ability to reason or engage with anyone whose views fall outside their narrow world view.
“Their rhetoric and actions have become dangerous, pushing us closer to a tipping point. With political and social division at an all-time high, the possibility of civil unrest is real.”
Babet said the nation was going through a state of the breakdown of civility and reason.
“If we don’t reclaim our country, the future could very well see the rise of political terrorism, and with it, the risk of civil war within our lifetime,” he said.
“This isn’t alarmism—it’s the reality we face if we don’t resist the left.”
West Australian Trumpet of Patriots Senate candidate Melissa Bannister said the video showed “absolutely disgusting” behaviour.
“You cannot have a logical discussion with these people,” she said.
Police said they were investigating the incident and had attended the scene and spoke to the man. No arrests or charges have been made but the investigation is ongoing.
The altercation is the second such incident to emerge this week. In a separate video posted by journalist Avi Yemini, a Liberal volunteer is shown being verbally abused by a man at an early voting centre in Ringwood, Victoria.
