‘Highly misleading’ viral video shared by One Nation’s Pauline Hanson sparks racial abuse in Voice to Parliament debate

One Nation leader Pauline Hanson has used a misleadingly edited viral video to claim a Yes vote in the Voice to Parliament referendum will lead to increasing conflict between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians.

WARNING: This story contains language that is hate speech.

Key points:

The video shows a confrontation between an Indigenous mother and daughter and an elderly white woman in the coastal Queensland town of Poona. It has accrued more than 1.5 million views across Facebook, Twitter and TikTok.

In the 48-second clip, the woman filming is heard shouting at a white woman to leave a stretch of foreshore which belongs to the Butchulla people and saying they “owned these lands to the exclusivity of all others which comes under federal native title”.

“You might not like it, but guess what? Times are changing. You don’t own the land, we do. Get off it, please,” the woman filming is heard saying.

Ms Hanson shared the video on her official Facebook page with the caption: “This is just a taste of what is to come if Australians don’t stop [Prime Minister Anthony] Albanese’s race-based Voice and its Treaty”.

However, the viral clip is not what it seems.

Pauline Hanson has been a central figure in the campaign against the Voice to Parliament.(AAP: Mick Tsikas)

ABC Investigations can reveal the footage shared by Ms Hanson was less than half of the original length, removing context of the incident.

The original version, posted 2.5 years ago by Butchulla woman Samala Cronin and her mother and elder Gemma Cronin, showed the argument actually began when the elderly woman’s husband had confronted them for filming.

“We started walking along the foreshore and people started coming out of their houses … next thing I hear this guy coming towards us and talking at us,” Samala Cronin told the ABC.

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In Samala Cronin’s video, a man approaches the pair, who ask him: “Can I help you?” After a brief exchange, he lunges at the camera and yells: “Don’t do that! Don’t take photos.”

Gemma Cronin is seen pushing him away and yelling: “Don’t f***ing touch my daughter.”

“When he lunged at the camera … my mum just went into protection mode,” Samala Cronin told the ABC.

She said they had “every right to be there” after the stretch of land they were standing on was exclusively granted to the Butchulla people in a 2019 native title decision.

At the end of the unedited version, Samala Cronin is heard telling her mother to stop shouting because of young children nearby.

The unedited version of the video provides context, including how the argument between the two families began.(Facebook)

ABC Investigations has chosen to not broadcast the video and it has confirmed none of the people who appear in it were aware the incident had resurfaced as part of the referendum debate.

RMIT FactLab editor and misinformation researcher Esther Chan said the incident had no connection to the Voice referendum and claims about Australians having to surrender their land had already been debunked.

“The edit is highly misleading as it leaves out important context and was perhaps designed to evoke an emotional reaction,” she said, adding much of that reaction had been racially charged.

The edited version has been widely shared by anti-Voice campaigners and conservative figures without proper context. One of the most prominent channels spreading the footage (which is the version Ms Hanson republished) is a TikTok account called @notothevoice23.

The account blocked ABC News on TikTok when it was approached for comment.

Many of the comments on Ms Hanson’s post of the video contain vitriolic abuse directed towards the Indigenous women, including a call for genocide against First Nations Australians.

The edited video was first published by former One Nation candidate Brett Johannsen on August 4, but among those who shared it, Ms Hanson had the largest audience.

Mr Johannsen said he did not edit the video himself but was sent a shortened version by a friend, whom he declined name, and added text calling for a No vote.

He denied the video was misleading and said he would not remove it from his Facebook page.

Misinformation researcher Esther Chan said the edited video was “highly misleading”.(ABC News: Kevin Nguyen)

The video and post were quietly removed from Ms Hanson’s Facebook page after her office was approached by ABC Investigations. One Nation declined to answer questions.

Meanwhile, both families in the video say they are extremely distressed that the incident has gone viral.

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Samala Cronin said she was overseas when the edited footage began picking up steam. Her Facebook and inbox have in the past few days been inundated with hateful and racist comments.

The other couple declined to comment. A relative told ABC Investigations the family had “already been crucified” and were being “crucified again”.

Ms Chan said videos like this were easy to weaponise, and elected officials, with their large platforms, had a responsibility to be more diligent about what they publish.

“[These videos] cost nothing to share and are very damaging to confidence in the Voice. It worked to promote a false, debunked narrative about the Voice’s impact on land rights and ownership,” she said.

“While they may want to make use of materials like this to promote against the Voice, they should consider carefully whether there’s the need to share a video that stokes racial division such as this one.”

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