Remember the AEC’s so-called “Font Size Case” (Australian Electoral Commission v Kelly [2023] FCA 854), which was nothing short of a taxpayer-funded hit job?
These bureaucrats abused their power and engaged in a vindictive, malicious prosecution by dragging me into the Federal Court over the font size of an authorisation statement, which correctly read: “Authorised by Craig Kelly”, on the bottom of just ten election posters.
Yes, a three-day Federal Court hearing over nothing more than font size, for an authorisation that was correctly worded and did not sway a single vote.
Sitting in that courtroom felt exactly like an old Soviet show trial, where a corrupt regime used the courts to punish and silence its political opponents.
To be clear, the law does not prescribe any specific font size for the authorisation statement. It simply requires that the authorisation statement “must be legible at a distance from which the sign can be viewed”.
It is also worth noting that they had no fewer than five barristers in the courtroom trying to get me.
However, the AEC was smashed in court. I had done my homework.
I called an expert witness, an optometrist, who testified that the font size I used was perfectly legible from 2.5 metres for a person with good eyesight. Without question, “a distance” from which these signs could be viewed was within 2.5 metres.
The judge did not mince words. The AEC’s conduct towards me was “unjustifiable and unreasonable”.
Now, the final FOI documents reveal the true cost of their malicious vendetta. The AEC forced taxpayers to fork out $250,000 to pay the lawyers who represented me, on top of the $254,444.73 they spent on their own external lawyers.
That is a staggering half a million dollars ($504,444) wasted on a petty font-size prosecution that should never have seen the inside of a courtroom.
Half a million dollars over the font size of an authorisation statement on ten election posters.
And that does not even include the AEC’s internal costs, the expense of running the court, or the weeks of my own time wasted preparing a defence, meeting with lawyers, and attending the trial.
No wonder Australia’s productivity is sliding backwards when unaccountable public servants treat taxpayers’ money like a personal slush fund for political score-settling.
And I know exactly why they came after me on such a frivolous matter.
I had publicly called out the AEC as human rights abusers for coercion and discrimination by threatening their own employees with dismissal unless they submitted to the experimental COVID mRNA injections. The AEC also refused to employ anyone for the 2022 election unless they had been injected at least twice.
That is what triggered this spiteful, vexatious prosecution.
The AEC was more than happy to gamble half a million dollars of taxpayers’ money, hoping they would get a complicit judge, bankrupt me with court costs, and slap me with a heavy fine, all to ensure I could never run for Parliament again.
Yet not a single person at the AEC has been sacked, disciplined, or even publicly rebuked for this disgraceful abuse of power.
Why has no one at the AEC lost their job over this obscene waste of public money?
They did not care about the law. They cared about revenge and making an example of anyone who dares criticise their authoritarian behaviour.
These people are not public servants. They are vindictive, unaccountable political operatives who treat taxpayers’ wallets as their personal fund for payback.
And look at the footer on the AEC’s emails: “Delivering democracy. 40 years of electoral integrity.”
What a joke.
This is the same AEC that separately dragged me into the Federal Court at 8 pm on the Friday night before the May 2022 election, seeking a court order that would have prevented me, the leader of a political party with candidates running in 150 seats, from campaigning on election day.
Had the AEC succeeded, I risked being found in contempt of court and facing a jail sentence simply for campaigning on election day.
This is the type of thing you would expect in a corrupt nation run by a military junta, but it is Australia today.
This pattern of behaviour reveals a deeper rot, not only within the AEC, but throughout Australia’s entire bureaucracy.
An ABC prepared to fraudulently add gunshots to a video in an attempt to stitch up an SAS soldier.
A Bureau of Meteorology prepared to cook the climate data.
A TGA prepared to grant approval to novel experimental medical products.
It is time for heads to roll at the AEC. This level of reckless, malicious incompetence cannot go unpunished.
May God have mercy on their souls should I ever return to Federal Parliament, where I can finally hold them to account.
Thought for the Day
“There is no crueler tyranny than that which is perpetrated under the shield of law and in the name of justice.” ― Montesquieu
Craig Kelly was a Liberal Member of Parliament (2010 - 2022) representing the seat of Hughes. He quit the Liberals in 2021 over their failure to defend liberties during COVID. He currently serves as Director of the Foundation for Economic Education.
