With immigration concerns high and a broader “anti-woke” base than previous years, One Nation is attracting older Australians and disaffected coalition voters as support swells to record levels.
And perhaps more significantly, party operatives have been buoyed by new members across the country, leading to more branches.
The resurgence of the party founded and led by Queensland senator Pauline Hanson has been confirmed with a pair of polls within days registering 15 per cent support.
That means one in seven voters told both Essential and Newspoll they’d vote for the minor, right-wing party if an election was held.
It also represents a new, high-water mark for the party across its 28-year history, and well above its 6.4 per cent nationwide vote at the May election.
The figure is no outlier, with other pollsters Redbridge (14 per cent), YouGov, Resolve and Roy Morgan (all 12 per cent) also putting the party’s support in double figures.
“It’s definitely a surge,” YouGov polling director Amir Daftari told AAP.
Central to the shift is the coalition’s poll drift.
Under moderate leader Sussan Ley, the coalition’s primary vote is down from 32 per cent at the May election to between 24 and 29 per cent in recent polls.
A YouGov analysis shows that of the coalition’s lost support since the election – voters who supported the coalition at the 2025 poll but are now planning to direct their ballot elsewhere – 54 per cent plan to vote One Nation.
“They tend to be older, a third of those are 65 and older,” Mr Daftari said.
“It’s basically a protest vote against their own party … capturing the coalition despondency and dropoff.
“If there was an election tomorrow, One Nation’s vote would surpass the Greens.”
One Nation’s 2025 election result was its biggest lower-house vote share since 1998, when Senator Hanson – who won the Queensland seat of Oxley in 1996 as a disendorsed Liberal – led the party to 8.4 per cent nationwide.
Back then, One Nation was a lightning rod almost solely for disaffection on immigration and Indigenous affairs.
The party believes it is now a broader movement and a review of its press releases since the May election shows its interest in other populist causes.
The most frequent topics to appear in journalists’ inboxes rail against transgender rights, renewable energy – specifically net-zero targets – and migration, including Gazan refugees.
One Nation staff believe they have benefited in the polls from firm stances to reduce migration and against climate energy targets: two issues the coalition is staging public post-election debates on.
“We’re adamant on our policy, they’re in-fighting,” one insider told AAP, while admitting the numbers were “quite clearly a response to the coalition’s lack of leadership”.
A Newspoll on Tuesday confirmed immigration was on the nose with many Australians, with 10 per cent wanting more migrants and 64 per cent wanting fewer.
The grab-bag of issues in One Nation’s policy offering mirror those held in the US by MAGA torchbearer Donald Trump, in the UK by Nigel Farage’s Reform and Winston Peters’ New Zealand First.
Showing the Trump connection, Ms Hanson – who is missing parliament during the current sitting week – was spotted at a Halloween party at the Florida residence of the US president.
Placed on the political spectrum, these are far-right positions.
The parties themselves reject these labels, saying their policies are “sensible” and pitched to the mainstream.
Sharron Duncan, one of One Nation’s best-performing candidates this year, said “anti-woke” was a “fair representation” of its positioning.
“The average Australian has had enough with some of the policies from the bigger parties and they’re looking for a different answer,” she said.
The party also felt a shift among older Australians.
“The 55-plus age group have the largest movement towards Pauline and One Nation,” she said.
“Older people have been around longer and seen a lot more … especially around societal norms where they want to see common sense prevail.”
Ms Duncan was the party’s 2025 Maranoa candidate and was one of two One Nation candidates to finish runner-up in an electorate, along with Stuart Bonds in Hunter.
She was well-beaten by Nationals Leader David Littleproud but might fancy her chances next time out, especially in a scenario in which Mr Littleproud is no longer the regional party’s leader.
Next time out, candidates will benefit from a beefed-up party machine and volunteer base.
Party spokesman Richard Henderson said a doubling of One Nation’s membership was allowing it to open branches across the country.
That included branches in Albury – Ms Ley’s electorate – and in Nationals heartland towns of Tamworth and Wagga Wagga.
Mr Henderson said growth was 300 per cent in Tasmania, where Senator Hanson’s daughter Lee narrowly missed out on a Senate seat in the May poll.
While it is clear that One Nation is enjoying a moment in the sunshine, Mr Daftari also cautioned the party fell short of its polling average, of around eight-to-nine per cent, at the recent election.
“People were intending to vote for them and fewer did,” he said.
