As Victoria's November state election approaches, One Nation has fielded 51 of its 88 lower house candidates, and the emerging roster invites a familiar question about the distance between a party's stated principles and its practiced ones. Among those standing are individuals with criminal convictions, ties to alleged underworld figures, and a record of amplifying discredited health claims — all despite the party's assurances of rigorous vetting. It is a tension as old as democratic politics itself: the gap between the standards a movement proclaims and the people it is willing to place befor
One Nation's Victorian slate includes candidates with underworld ties and debunked health claims
I'm not here to judge people. I'm here to help people.
Mark
So One Nation says it's doing deep background checks on candidates, but then Michael Piastrino's campaign launch is attended by people with organised crime convictions. How does that happen?
Mimi
The party says Piastrino met these men through church, and he told local media he's not there to judge people. But the optics are stark—Malaki Salesui was convicted for his role in a car-theft ring, and Mick Mantzaris has a history of drug-related convictions and was targeted in a drive-by shooting. Police described him as an associate of outlaw motorcycle gang members.
Luke
Wait—did One Nation vet who would attend the campaign launch, or just vet Piastrino himself? Those are different things. And we should be clear: Piastrino's attendance at the launch is a fact. The people who showed up and commented on his Instagram posts is a fact. But we don't know if One Nation vetted the guest list or if Piastrino invited them independently.
Mark
Fair point. What about the health claims—Elita Dabrowski promoting the paracetamol-autism link?
Mimi
She deleted the tweet, but we have it. She wrote in September 2025 that Trump's announcement on autism and paracetamol "reflects what I see in clinic every day." She's a naturopath. Scientists have disputed Trump's claim entirely.
Luke
And she's deleted it since announcing her candidacy, which suggests someone—maybe the party, maybe her—realised it was a liability. But the fact that she posted it in the first place, and that One Nation accepted her as a candidate, tells you something about the vetting.
Mark
What about Ben Lucas and the drink-driving conviction?
Mimi
He resigned from Baw Baw shire council in 2021 after being convicted of drink-driving and dangerous driving. He was fined $2,000 and lost his licence for two years. This month he pleaded guilty to operating an ice bath facility without registering it, and he's been ordered to pay $3,000 in costs. He's framed it all as administrative oversights and a "storm in a teacup."
Luke
But here's what matters: One Nation knew about the drink-driving conviction when they selected him as a candidate. They accepted it. That's not a vetting failure—that's a choice.
Mark
And Tammy Lindrum's comments about Muslim and First Nations people?
Mimi
She wrote on Threads that there's "Black and Muslim supremacy in Australia," that white people "can't say anything," and asked when government spending on Indigenous welfare would stop. These are still up, as far as we know.
Luke
The difference is she hasn't deleted them. So either One Nation didn't see them, or they saw them and didn't care. Either way, it's a problem with the vetting claim.
Mark
The party says it's doing "very comprehensive deep dives" into social media. How comprehensive can it be if these posts are still there?
Mimi
That's the tension at the heart of this story. One Nation says it's strengthened its vetting. But the candidates it's selected have drink-driving convictions, ties to people with organised crime histories, endorsements of debunked health claims, and inflammatory comments about minorities. The vetting process exists, but it's not filtering out what most voters would consider disqualifying.
The Pulse
- One Nation's candidate list for Victoria reads less like a vetted roster and more like a catalogue of unresolved controversies — drink-driving convictions, organised crime adjacency, and deleted social media posts are recurring features.
- The campaign launch of Berwick candidate Michael Piastrino drew attendees with criminal records and alleged underworld connections, raising immediate questions about the company a would-be lawmaker keeps.
- Candidates across multiple seats have quietly scrubbed their social media histories since announcing their candidacies, suggesting an awareness that their past statements could not withstand public scrutiny.
- The party's general manager publicly boasted of a 'comprehensive deep dive' into candidates' backgrounds — a claim made harder to sustain when the Victorian leader himself acknowledged a history of drug use and drink-driving.
- With several candidates contesting seats in genuine play — including Labor and Liberal marginals — the controversy threatens to overshadow whatever policy ground One Nation hoped to gain.
As Victoria's November state election approaches, One Nation has fielded 51 of its 88 lower house candidates, and the emerging roster invites a familiar question about the distance between a party's stated principles and its practiced ones. Among those standing are individuals with criminal convictions, ties to alleged underworld figures, and a record of amplifying discredited health claims — all despite the party's assurances of rigorous vetting. It is a tension as old as democratic politics itself: the gap between the standards a movement proclaims and the people it is willing to place before voters.
One Nation has announced 51 of its 88 lower house candidates for Victoria's November state election, and the list has drawn immediate scrutiny for the gap between the party's claimed vetting rigour and the records of those it has endorsed.
In the outer-suburban seat of Berwick, candidate Michael Piastrino held a campaign launch attended by a man convicted in 2021 for involvement in an organised car-theft ring. An individual who pleaded guilty in 2012 to possessing testosterone and misleading police — and whom police later described as a motorcycle gang associate — commented approvingly on photographs from the event. A nephew of a slain underworld figure also responded to Piastrino's posts, pledging his vote. Piastrino, who previously ran for the Liberals and was forced to apologise during that campaign for inflammatory remarks about former Premier Daniel Andrews, said he had met the men through church and was 'not here to judge people.'
In Narracan, Ben Lucas resigned from Baw Baw shire council in 2021 following convictions for drink-driving and dangerous driving, receiving a fine and a two-year licence suspension. This month he pleaded guilty to operating an unregistered ice bath facility at his gym, dismissing the matter on Facebook as an 'administrative oversight' and questioning whether the scrutiny would have followed had he not been a One Nation candidate.
Elita Dabrowski, contesting the Labor-held seat of Sunbury, has deleted social media posts in which she expressed pride — as a naturopath — in Donald Trump's discredited claim linking paracetamol use in pregnancy to autism. Several other candidates have similarly purged their online histories since announcing their candidacies.
Elsewhere on the ticket, one candidate left a trail of inflammatory comments about Muslim and First Nations people on social media, while another — who describes himself as an enthusiast of ABC programming — is standing for a party that has pledged to defund the national broadcaster.
One Nation's leadership has maintained that it employs sophisticated technology to conduct thorough background and social media checks on candidates. Yet the party's own Victorian leader acknowledged this month that he has a history of drug use and drink-driving. The cumulative picture is of a vetting process that, whatever its stated ambitions, has not resolved the tension between the party's public standards and the candidates it continues to field.
One Nation has filled 51 of its 88 lower house candidate slots for Victoria's November state election, and the roster reveals a pattern that sits uneasily with the party's stated commitment to rigorous vetting. The candidates include a former Liberal councillor with a drink-driving conviction, a naturopath who amplified a debunked claim linking a common painkiller to autism, and a hairdresser whose campaign launch drew attendees with documented ties to organised crime.
Michael Piastrino, running for the outer-suburban seat of Berwick, launched his campaign on a Sunday in September. The event was attended by Malaki Salesui, who was convicted in 2021 for his role in an organised car-theft ring. On Instagram, Mick Mantzaris—a man who pleaded guilty in 2012 to possessing testosterone and misleading the office of police integrity, and who police later described as "an associate of some outlaw motorcycle gang members"—commented approvingly on photographs from the launch. Anthony Younan, nephew of slain underworld figure Nabil Maghnie, also responded to Piastrino's posts, saying he would vote for One Nation because of him. Piastrino, when asked about these connections by local media, said he had met the men through church and that he was "not here to judge people."
Piastrino is not new to controversy. He ran for the Liberals in 2022 and was forced to apologise during that campaign after declaring that Daniel Andrews would be "brought to justice for the murder of 800 people" under a Liberal government. He switched parties and is now contesting the same seat, which the Liberal Brad Battin holds on a margin of 4.7 percent.
Ben Lucas, One Nation's candidate for the Liberal-held seat of Narracan, resigned from Baw Baw shire council in 2021 after being convicted of drink-driving and dangerous driving. Court records show he was fined $2,000 and had his licence suspended for two years. This month he pleaded guilty to operating an ice bath facility at his gym without registering it with the council and was ordered to pay $3,000 in costs. On Facebook, he characterised the charges as a "storm in a teacup" blown out of proportion, describing them as an "administrative oversight," and asked whether the same scrutiny would have followed if he were not involved with One Nation.
Elita Dabrowski, contesting the seat of Sunbury—a Labor stronghold that the party believes it could win—has since deleted social media posts that endorsed Donald Trump's claim that paracetamol use in pregnancy raises the risk of autism in children. In a tweet from September 2025, she wrote that as a naturopath and functional health practitioner, she felt "proud" that Trump's announcement "reflects what I see in clinic every day." Scientists have disputed Trump's assertion. Dabrowski is among several candidates who have scrubbed their social media accounts since announcing their candidacies.
Tammy Lindrum, One Nation's candidate for the historically safe Labor seat of Albert Park, left a trail of comments on Meta's Threads about Muslim and First Nations people. Under the handle "Lindrum Legends," she wrote in April 2025 that there was "Black and Muslim supremacy in Australia" and that "the Whitman [sic] can't say anything as they risk being accused of being racist." Three months later she wrote, "If you don't like Bacon go back to a Muslim country." Responding to a post about making the First Peoples' Assembly of Victoria permanent, she asked, "When does that stop?" in reference to government spending on Indigenous housing, welfare, education, and health.
Bruce Whalley, announced this week as a candidate for Labor-held Bundoora, tweeted during the 2019 student climate strikes that "Climate change is the fault of kids" and urged them to walk, ride bikes, or use public transport instead of asking for lifts. He describes himself on Instagram as an "ABC2 TV Think Tank tragic"—a detail that sits oddly given One Nation's stated plan to defund the ABC and its ban on the broadcaster's journalists attending party events.
One Nation's leadership has said the party has strengthened its candidate vetting process ahead of the election. Kelvin Morton, the party's general manager, told the media in June that One Nation had employed technology to conduct a "very comprehensive deep dive" into candidates' social media accounts and provide a "thorough assessment" of their characters. Party leader Pauline Hanson announced the upper house candidates and Victorian leader Warren Pickering at a press conference last month. Pickering himself acknowledged this month that he had a history of drug use and drink-driving. The party's willingness to accept candidates with controversial histories, combined with the roster that has emerged, suggests that the vetting process, however comprehensive, has not filtered out individuals whose backgrounds and statements raise serious questions about judgment and values.
Notable Quotes
I'm not here to judge people. I'm here to help people.— Michael Piastrino, on his connections to men with criminal convictions
One Nation has employed technology that does a very comprehensive deep dive into potential candidates' social media accounts and provides a thorough assessment of their characters.— Kelvin Morton, One Nation general manager, June 2026
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Politics & Governance