‘Treated like pawns in his political chess game’: Chinese voters unleash on Dutton

After Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton’s ABC debate, Karen Middleton predicted that as polls continue to favour Labor, Dutton would become bolder and willing to take more risks – that he may decide to “go all out”. This, she believed, could pose a threat to Labor.

Judging by what Dutton has said and done since that debate, that prediction appears right. So far, one “bold” move of the opposition leader has been declaring that if he wins the election, he may bring back Mike Pezzullo, who was sacked as Home Affairs secretary in 2023 for misconduct and later stripped of his Order of Australia honour.

Many voters today likely associate Pezzullo with this misconduct, but to most Chinese Australians, his name is synonymous with war-mongering. The former public servant is a long-term staunch national security hawk who wants the US-Australia alliance to “go on a war footing”, and has speculated that a conflict with China may be “only 33 months away”. Mere days ago, on ANZAC Day, Pezzullo again sounded the alarm that “the drums are beating once again”.

The prospect of Dutton bringing back Pezzullo is a source of disquiet for many Chinese Australians. Curiously, it was only last month that Pezzullo appeared to serve no value to the Coalition except as a scapegoat. Speaking to a large crowd of Chinese Australians in downtown Sydney, Liberal MP and candidate for Menzies Keith Wolahan was keen to disabuse his audience of the notion that the opposition leader was a war-monger, clarifying that “Peter Dutton never said ‘drums of war’. It was Mike Pezzullo.”

The Coalition then pledged $21 billion in increased defence spending over the next five years, with further increases over the following five years to bring Australia in line with the Trump administration’s expectation of America’s allies to spend 3% of GDP on defence.

There has been widespread scepticism about where this money would come from and what it would be spent on. But to conservative media consumers now sufficiently primed to fear an eventual Chinese invasion, this announcement could not have come soon enough. The Australian told its readers this spending puts Australia on a “war footing”, while Chris Uhlmann endorsed spending “way more” on defence against “an aggressive Xi Jinping”, given Trump can’t be relied on to come to our aid.

Dutton’s proposed defence cash injection may be a much-needed tranquilliser for those worried about a China takeover. However, many Chinese Australians fear it’s precisely this rhetoric and spending that will make an actual war more likely.

A 2023 study of new migrants from China found that an overwhelming majority (91%) were concerned by the Australian English-language media’s tendency to speculate about a war with China. These respondents primarily believed such speculation could become a self-fulfilling prophecy, and were equally concerned about how Chinese Australians would be treated if this were to occur. 

One survey participant explained her concern:

During WW1, many German-Australians were interned in Australia. During WW2, many Italian migrants were interned. Sure, ours is now a very multicultural society, but who can assure us this won’t happen to us when war breaks out? When war happens, rationality may go out the window. Look at what happened to Jewish people. I’m really worried. My daughter recently came home from school and asked me if it’s true that China will invade Australia.

When discussing the news of defence spending premised on the need to put Australia on a war footing, one group member in my WeChat group, who until now has been a Liberal supporter, said:

In historical terms, the Liberals have done some good things. For instance, they made a positive contribution to changing the White Australia policy. The China-Australia Free Trade Agreement was also signed by the Coalition. But now the Liberals are veering further and further to the right and seem to be obsessed with war. This is why I can no longer condone them.

But amid the Coalition’s apparent “all-out” lurch to the right, nothing prepared Chinese Australians for the news of its preference deal with One Nation. Last Wednesday, ABC journalist Annabel Crabb’s article on this topic, translated by the ABC’s Chinese-language team, was the most posted link in the two dozen WeChat groups I follow. 

For some undecided Chinese-Australian voters, it was the news of the defrosting of the Coalition’s relationship with Pauline Hanson – having abruptly disendorsed her as a Liberal candidate in 1996 – that is pushing them away from the Liberals. Hanson is well-known for her verbal assaults on many groups – Chinese, Japanese, Muslims and Indigenous peoples, among others – but it was her 1996 maiden speech with her now-infamous one-liner, “I believe we are in danger of being swamped by Asians”, that has stuck in the minds of many Asian Australians.

The disbelief at the Coalition’s preference deal with Hanson was palpable in many discussions I’ve witnessed on WeChat over the last few days. Here’s a sample:

I am not very knowledgeable about politics; All I know is that categorically I won’t give my vote to anyone who has done a deal with Hanson.

We had the illusion that the Liberals had really changed their minds about Chinese-Australians. Seems we’ve been taken for a ride.

 We’ve been treated like pawns in their political chess game. 

Finally, Dutton has stopped pretending.

From this week onwards Dutton is the real Dutton. So, to those who still dream about Dutton being nice to us, it’s time to wake up!

A Perth-based voter who has been helping a minor party with their campaign said that, from the anecdotal evidence they saw, a few people in their network were now less vocal about their Liberal support after the Coalition’s announcements this week. 

And as one Canberra-based Labor supporter said:

I have a few friends who’ve been staunch supporters of the Liberal Party and who also like Dutton. But after seeing the Coalition’s recent manoeuvres they seem to be sobering up. Some are turning to Labor, others to independents. One person I know is not even a Labor volunteer, but she’s actively campaigning for Labor.

So, perhaps Dutton’s risk-taking isn’t quite the threat to Labor that Karen Middleton imagined. In fact, the Coalition could well be undoing its previous hard work of building goodwill among Chinese-Australian communities, giving the impression it was merely “pretending” all along. 

It will become clear soon enough whether this will translate into any seats changing hands.