The Liberal Party will have just one more seat than One Nation in South Australia\u2019s lower house, leaving opposition leader Ashton Hurn little margin for error.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Senator Antic’s supporters fiercely reject that argument, saying the party has lost two consecutive state elections under moderate leadership.<\/p>\n
This includes the March state election where the Liberals were left clinging to opposition status with just five seats and a primary vote four points below One Nation’s.<\/p>\n
“Alex Antic signals to those people it’s okay to come home,” one conservative source said of the party’s lost voters to One Nation.<\/p>\n
Another Right faction source added: “Alex Antic running for president is effectively a referendum on whether the Liberal Party is a conservative party.”<\/p>\n
How did the Liberals end up here?<\/p>\n
The rebel senator<\/p>\n
Since he was elected in 2019, Senator Antic has been bestowed several titles by the media: “conservative firebrand”, “Right faction kingpin”, “rebel senator”.<\/p>\n
But the backbencher has more recently taken on the role as the Liberal Party’s chief advocate for peace with One Nation.<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/090e898105e2ea905fa9af94dc080216.jpeg\")
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Senator Alex Antic is currently the only nominee for the presidency of the South Australian Liberal Party. (AAP: Mick Tsikas)<\/p>\n
With federal leader Angus Taylor trying to sharpen the Liberal Party’s attacks on the right-wing party<\/a>, Senator Antic has been enthusing about One Nation’s members and arguing a post-election coalition should not be ruled out.<\/p>\n He also publicly defended One Nation senator Malcolm Roberts as he came under fire for past comments about COVID vaccines, chemtrails and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones.<\/a> Liberal MPs were among those taking aim at Senator Roberts.<\/p>\n Loading…<\/p>\n It’s left Mr Taylor having to handle repeated lines of media questioning about his backbencher<\/a>, muddying the party’s messaging against their right-wing opponents.<\/p>\n Ashton Hurn, the moderate leader of the state party facing her own One Nation battle, has similarly had to distance herself from Senator Antic’s views.<\/p>\n For example, in June, Senator Antic made a self-described “off the cuff” remark that the arrival of bird flu could be an innovative way for pharmaceutical companies to sell products<\/a>.<\/p>\n “These companies have made some of the best public relations steps you’d ever see \u2014 protect yourself, protect grandma, protect the vulnerable and now we’ve got avian influenza doing the heavy lifting,” he said at the time.<\/p>\n Ms Hurn, incidentally, was holding a press conference that week to emphasise the seriousness of bird flu.<\/p>\n Ashton Hurn navigates the fraught politics of One Nation preference deals<\/a><\/p>\n South Australia’s embattled Liberals have openly declared their willingness to strike a preference deal with One Nation. Will it help or hurt them on election day?<\/p>\n She told reporters she did not support Senator Antic’s bird flu views “in any way, shape or form”.<\/p>\n That incident is to say nothing about Senator Antic’s well-publicised pre-election beer<\/a> with One Nation SA leader Cory Bernardi.<\/p>\n Nor Senator Antic rebuking the state Liberals before polling day for preparing to disendorse a candidate over their previous comments about same-sex marriage and feminism.<\/a><\/p>\n “If this guy is disendorsed, or if he feels compelled to leave, we might as well shut the doors on this election with one week to go,” Senator Antic said at the time in a public display of disunity that was seized upon by Labor.<\/p>\n The moderate anxiety<\/p>\n With four weeks until the SA Liberal Party’s annual general meeting, Senator Antic remains the only declared candidate for state president, a role roughly equivalent to chair of a company board.<\/p>\n Liberal Party elder Trish Worth, who represented the federal seat of Adelaide from 1993 to 2004, is among the moderates worried about the direction the party could take under under an Antic presidency.<\/p>\n “His suggestion that we should form a coalition in South Australia with One Nation is extraordinary and bad,” Ms Worth said.<\/p>\n “And for someone like that to think he could stand for an important position in the Liberal Party I think is way out of line.”<\/p>\n Ms Worth remains involved in the Liberal Party as a delegate to State Council \u2014 a body of roughly 220 party members that will vote on the next party president.<\/p>\n Trish Worth believes Alex Antic should “stick to” his role as a Senator for South Australia. (ABC News)<\/p>\n She argues Ashton Hurn needs a “good, stable organisational wing” rather than one that is “sprouting policy or directions that should be taken”.<\/p>\n “He hasn’t been helpful in the past, so why would we expect him to be helpful in the future?” Ms Worth said.<\/p>\n “He’s paid by the taxpayers to be a senator, and that involves representing South Australia and I think he should stick to that senate role.”<\/p>\n Senator Antic dismissed reports from the Nine newspapers last week that he was angling for a merger of the SA Liberal division with One Nation.<\/p>\n “That has been made up. That is just outright not right,” he told the 2 Worlds Collide Podcast.<\/p>\n Party insiders have also responded with scepticism, suggesting it would take a two-thirds majority of State Council to agree.<\/p>\n “Even strong right leaning Liberals would have a problem with that,” Senator Antic said, adding that there would also be financial complications.<\/p>\n Asked by the ABC about Ms Worth’s comments and whether the merger reports were inaccurate, Senator Antic replied: “It’s not up to me to correct the record. Stop wasting my time”.<\/p>\n The conservative charge<\/p>\n The role of president is currently held by Right-aligned senator Leah Blyth.<\/p>\n The responsibilities of the role include overseeing party campaign preparations, setting meeting agendas and driving an annual program of activities for members.<\/p>\n The president also sits on the candidate review committee, which vets candidates for preselection, as well as the Liberal Party’s state and federal executives.<\/p>\n “That’s where it becomes relevant to Angus Taylor,” a moderate source said of Senator Antic’s bid.<\/p>\n “This whole idea that you can just sort of just ignore South Australia, ignore the states, let them do their own thing, you would think it becomes a bit different when these people are popping up to sit at the table in the same room as you.”<\/p>\n But conservatives argue Senator Antic’s presidency will make both Angus Taylor and Ashton Hurn’s job easier by providing stability to the SA division.<\/p>\n One Right faction source predicted a “mass exodus” of party members if another candidate were elected president.<\/p>\n They also pointed to the role Senator Antic has played in recruiting new members to the party.<\/p>\n “Over the last five years, it’s been well reported that I’ve been unashamedly out trying to get people join up and get involved,” Senator Antic told 2 Worlds Collide.<\/p>\n It’s those new members who have gradually won more internal elections for delegate positions, building Senator Antic’s power base on State Council, which ultimately votes on his senate preselection and bid for president.<\/p>\n Do you know more about this story? Get in touch with Thomas Kelsall at thomaskelsall<\/a>@proton.me<\/a><\/p>\n This year’s delegate elections within the party’s State and Federal Electorate Conventions (SECs and FECs) \u2014 made up of all Liberal members enrolled to vote within a specific seat \u2014 has seen the moderates lose control of the Morialta SEC and Sturt FEC, two seats once held by senior moderates John Gardner and Christopher Pyne.<\/p>\n Former SA Liberal leader Isobel Redmond was among those to stand for a delegate position in Sturt this year. She was defeated by a Right-aligned candidate.<\/p>\n Ms Redmond declined to comment when contacted.<\/p>\n “It shows that there’s a massive changing of the guard taking place inside the Liberal Party,” a Right-aligned source said.<\/p>\n Senator Antic said the “vision” for his recruitment drive has been to “give the party back to the membership”.<\/p>\n “The members now are back to increasingly where it used to be where there are groups of members that are running their own show around the state, and we hope we will continue to sort of pump in decent candidates,” he said<\/p>\n “We had a heap at the last federal election \u2014 we just couldn’t get them elected.<\/p>\n “We want members in, so that we can get the right people, true Liberals \u2026 because I need help in Canberra.”<\/p>\n The party will hold its AGM on August 29.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"What happens when the Liberal Party’s most One Nation-friendly senator gets elected to a powerful internal position? 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