Katherine Deves to nominate for Jim Molan’s NSW Senate vacancy

Katherine Deves will nominate for the Liberal Party’s NSW Senate spot, re-entering the political fray just a year after she sparked a firestorm over her trans views.

Katherine Deves will nominate for the NSW senate vacancy, just a year after she sparked a firestorm over her controversial views. Picture: Adam Yip

Katherine Deves will nominate for the Liberal Party’s NSW Senate vacancy, re-entering the political fray just a year after she sparked a firestorm over her controversial views.

After being anointed by former prime minister Scott Morrison to run in the Sydney northern beaches seat of Warringah, Ms Deves faced ­opprobrium after her history of controversial online comments ­regarding transgender children surfaced during the 2022 federal election campaign.

After initially apologising for the comments – including saying trans children were being “surgically mutilated and sterilised” – Ms Deves later doubled down, ­saying that while she acknowledged her “confronting” language she stood by the “substance of her arguments”.

Despite the furore, Ms Deves said she had been approached by senior members of the Liberal Party encouraging her to run for the spot vacated after the death of Jim Molan earlier this year, but said she would not back away from the divisive views that resulted in her widespread condemnation.

“Trans rights are men’s and women’s rights being renegotiated. I am on the side of not conceding unnecessary ground on rights hard fought and won by our foremothers over the past 125 years,” she told The Australian.

Ms Deves said her views had been “vindicated” by the decision by World Athletics to tighten rules on transgender women athletes in March, along with the closure of UK’s only child gender identity clinic Tavistock by the National Health Service last July.

Her efforts to enter parliament will likely be met by fierce resistance from within the party, with a number of senior Liberal Party members, including former NSW treasurer Matt Kean, senator ­Andrew Bragg and former North Sydney MP Trent Zimmerman criticising her.

“There is no place in a mainstream political party for bigotry,’’ Mr Kean said at the time.

Ms Deves said if successful, she would oppose the campaign to enshrine a voice to parliament in the constitution, saying there were a myriad problems at play.

“I have much to contribute on a variety of issues beyond that for which I’ve become known, the debate of the moment is the voice,”

“I support Indigenous voices, particularly grassroots voices, and I respect that constitutional recognition of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in our Constitution. But I am concerned first, about the entrenchment of a group right in the constitution.”

Ms Deves said if Warren Mundine – who The Australian understands has also been encouraged to nominate – decided to run, she would stand aside, to avoid splitting the conservative vote at the preselection, expected to be held in late May.

With moderates coalescing around NSW Liberal Party ­president Maria Kovacic as their preferred candidate, Ms Deves faces an uphill battle to garner the necessary votes to win the preselection.

While regional moderates support former NSW transport minister Andrew Constance, senior moderate sources said they had sufficient numbers to get Ms ­Kovacic over the line after securing support from the centre-right.

Insiders said the moderates faction was eager to see a woman fill the vacancy, and noted Ms Kovacic’s credentials in western Sydney, an area that had decisive swings to Labor at the state election.

Ms Deves said that the vacancy should remain with the conservative faction given Molan had been aligned with the right before his death, telling moderates to wait until moderate federal senator Marise Payne retired from parliament.

Jess Collins will also run as a conservative-backed candidate for the Senate vacancy.