The Australian Electoral Commission has cleared host Abbie Chatfield of any wrongdoing after she interviewed Anthony Albanese on her podcast, finding her content “does not require an authorisation statement”.
Liberal senators questioned whether some of Chatfield’s social media content should have been classed as electoral material – which would require an official authorisation statement.
Anthony Albanese and Adam Bandt have both been interviewed on Chatfield’s podcast, It’s A Lot, in recent weeks. Clips of the interviews were shared on both politicians’ social media accounts.
Chatfield has separately encouraged her 532,000 followers to put the Liberal party last on ballot papers.
In a statement, an AEC spokesperson said that while the podcasts “could be viewed as being made for purpose of influencing how someone casts their vote, there is no evidence that there was a monetary benefit for the podcaster as a result of either Albanese or Bandt being invited onto the show”.
The spokesperson said the AEC was “not satisfied” that Chatfield’s podcast episodes, aired on 21 February and 11 March, could be considered to be paid advertising or to be communicated by or on behalf of a political candidate or party and her posts didn’t require an authorisation.
“It appears that the invitations to Albanese or Bandt to participate were voluntary,” they said, adding the review’s outcome had been made public “out of fairness” to Chatfield due to ongoing media coverage.
“In addition, questions put to both interviewees were sourced from the podcast’s audience.
“There is no evidence that either Albanese or Bandt had creative control in relation to the questions that were asked.”
In a post to her Instagram account on Thursday evening, Chatfield said the Coalition had raised concerns about her social media posts to make an “example out of someone” and “scapegoat” a leftwing influencer to “create distrust within the Australian public”.
“It has caused me an immense amount of stress, not because I’m not used to being in a fucking media frenzy … but because it terrifies me that these are the strategies that mainstream media and Liberal Party are resorting to,” she wrote.
“There was no evidence at all that I was paid … but I was made an example of. I was anxious all fucking day that I could get fined, I could lose my account … I was scared that I would lose sponsorships because my integrity was questioned.”
Chatfield also addressed the concerns on this week’s episode of her podcast, including unverified allegations that influencers were being paid to attend the federal budget or post material on social media.
About a dozen influencers, content creators and podcasters – most of them young women – were invited to attend the lockup for last month’s Labor budget alongside journalists from traditional media.
“It’s so funny that the Liberal party can’t comprehend that maybe young people, AKA influencers, just fucking hate the Liberal party,” Chatfield said.
“I was not paid to post for the Greens. There’s actually been no verified accounts of influencers being paid to attend the budget.
“There’s moral panic about influencers in politics.”
