Lidia Thorpe says her father ‘threw me under the bus’ after he called her ‘racist’ in TV interview

Firebrand Senator Lidia Thorpe says her father “threw her under the bus” when he called her “very racist” on national television.

Senator Lidia Thorpe has accused her father of throwing her “under the bus” in the wake of his TV interview last week, in which he claimed she was “very racist against white people”.

Ms Thorpe spoke to activist Tom Tanuki in a lengthy interview posted on YouTube yesterday, which covered several of her recent controversies from a sympathetic angle.

“When I pay attention to the things you say, I am never left in any doubt as to exactly what your politics are. I always get an extremely firm sense of your perspective,” Mr Tanuki told the independent senator, who quit the Greens back in February over disagreements on the proposed Indigenous voice to parliament.

“Your actions, even protest actions, marry up with your words. More than most politicians, let’s face it. You are ostensibly bulls*** free, in that you mean what you say and you will take actions to show that you mean it.”

“And that’s always got me into trouble,” Ms Thorpe interjected.

“Because I’m a straight shooter, straight talker, I’ve got nothing to hide, and people struggle with that. And they want me to conform to what? What do you want me to be like? Do you want me to be like Pauline Hanson, do you want me to be like Jacinta Price? You know, what’s a good model politician that you want me to be like?

“Obviously being myself is hard for people to understand. I’m a good person. I have a beautiful relationship, I have beautiful children. And my dad’s been texting me all morning, telling me he loves me, even though he threw me under the bus on Andrew Bolt.

“So, you know, we all have our own lives and our own complications, but I’m a loving person, and I’m genuinely wanting to bring this country together. Working class conservatives and the left, on a journey towards peace and healing.”

Lidia Thorpe speaking to Tom Tanuki. Picture: Tom Tanuki/YouTube

Ms Thorpe’s father, Roy Illingworth, spoke to Sky News Australia host Andrew Bolt on Thursday night and publicly criticised her, saying he was “disappointed” by her abandoning her English and Irish roots.

“The way I see it, the way she is and the way she's changed over the years, she’s a very racist person against white people,” he said.

“She doesn’t acknowledge any of her white side. I’m a bit disappointed in the way she’s been carrying on lately.

“Because after all, she does have English background as well as Irish, the convict side.

“She’s never, ever mentioned me in her speeches, never mentioned anything about a white father, which disappointed me a little bit.”

Mr Illingworth said he’d fallen out with his daughter and had no contact with her children, though she did still ring him on his birthday and Father’s Day.

“She’s said a lot of bad and evil things to me over the years,” he claimed.

“We still love each other and, at the end of the day, she’s still my daughter.”

In his telling, Ms Thorpe became politicised in her late teens and “turned racist”. But Mr Illingworth did acknowledge she was a “strong woman”.

Lidia Thorpe's father speaking to Andrew Bolt. Picture: Sky News

Ms Thorpe has been at the centre of multiple contentious incidents, the most recent being when she was involved in a heated altercation with a group of men outside a Melbourne strip club at 3am.

In footage of the profanity-laced confrontation, Ms Thorpe could be heard taunting the men, one of whom called her a racist dog, and saying one had a “small penis”.

She said she had not started the exchange and was responding to harassment.

Ms Thorpe further addressed the incident during her conversation with Mr Tanuki.

“When I said that person had a little d**k, it was for the reason that you waited for us to walk out of the door and then, you had all your mates around you, and then you had a go at me,” she said.

“I mean, don’t call yourself a man or a bigshot standing outside the door if you can basically wait and plan to have a go at a black senator who was spending money in the club, but also having some really beautiful conversations and yarns.

“What has been portrayed is blatantly wrong, and it’s also exemplary of how this country deals with people like me, whether I’m a senator or not. I’m a black woman, and look at how black women are treated in this country.”

The contentious incident was caught on video. Picture: 7 News

Mr Tanuki asked Ms Thorpe why she thought the “Australian political media establishment” was “so concerned with policing your rudeness?”

“I think different elements of the political spectrum have different reasons,” she replied.

“If you look at the right-wing media, they’re scared. They’re becoming the minority, and they’ve not had to deal with truth in the way that’s being put in their face every day.

“In terms of the progressives, they’ve all got their hands on their heart and they’re feeling really good about the voice, it appeases their white guilt, makes them feel like they’ve done something for us.

“Even though they won’t pay the rent, or force the government to stop deaths in custody, or stop child removal, or give us our rights.”