Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price drops post election bombshell as she defects to Liberal Party

Prominent anti-Voice campaigner Jacinta Price has confirmed she will move to sit with the Liberal Party in an effort to “rebuild” the party after a blustering election loss.

The Country Liberal senator said she believed the Liberal Party was her “natural home” and “somewhere I can contribute meaningfully” in a statement shared on Thursday.

While Senator Price is a member of the Country Liberal Party in the Northern Territory, where there aren’t separate outfits for the National and Liberals, she previously sat in the Nationals party room.

In her statement, she confirmed her decision was not “any way a reflection on the National Party,” and not a decision she made “lightly”.

“I am deeply appreciative of the opportunities the National Party under David Littleproud’s leadership has given me, most notably the responsibility of leading the No campaign in the Voice referendum,” she said.

“I do however feel the Liberal Party is my natural home and somewhere I can contribute meaningfully.”

Instead, she said she wanted to help “rebuild” the party and believed she would be “more effective” sitting in the Liberal Party party room.

“I want to bring back our core values of liberty, individual freedom and responsibility, the rule of law, free market and economic prosperity, minimal government intervention, a fair go and most of all, love for our nation, Australia,” she said.

“Let this be the moment we stop whispering our values and start declaring them again, not as fringe ideas, but as the foundation on which this country was built.

“Let this serve as a reminder that our duty is not to win favour with the few, but to stand united with the man – those who Menzies recognised, those who Howard defended, and those we must fight for now.”

According to party convention, Senator Price should sit with the Nationals as the first person on the Country Liberal Northern Territory ticket, while a prospective second senator would sit with the Liberal party.

While both electorates a held by Labor, a Country Liberal MP for Lingiari would also sit in the Nationals party room, while the MP for Solomon would sit with the Liberal party.

Prior to Thursday, Senator Price has been grilled on whether she would defect to the Liberal party room, and neither confirmed or denied the commentary.

Speaking to Sky on Tuesday, she said that while it was “expected of me” to sit with the Nationals, she was “still waiting for the dust to settle with a lot of the issues we’re confronted with”.

“We’re still reeling from the outcome that’s occurred and we need to understand much better how we as a Coalition we can come back stronger and learn from those lessons,” she said.

“I’m a fighter, and I want to make sure we can fight back and come back stronger.”

During the campaign, Senator Price was questioned over to decision to shout: “Make Australia great again,” during a Liberal Party rally in Perth, however when questioned by journalists she accused the media of being “obsessed with Trump”.

Her strident defence of her actions and press conference performance led to Peter Dutton promising her a cabinet position if the Coalition won government.