At 10.10pm,Latham,the leader of One Nation in the Upper House of NSW state parliament,posted the tweet that sparked the backlash and led to Nine managements’ condemnation.
“Never trust an Abo with something as important as that,” he wrote.
Despite being widely condemned on Twitter as a racist slur Latham pleaded innocence,tellingThe Daily Mail on Monday morning that the response was “an example of how the Outrage Industry fails to understand how words can have multiple meanings,and the true meaning lies with the speaker,not necessarily the listener”.
That “multiple meanings” line stood in contrast to Latham’s own position at 8.16am on Monday,when he replied to a poster’s observation that the comment was “clever because it works on two levels” with the response:“Only one level.”
In Nine’s view,there is no question what Latham meant. (Nine is the publisher of this masthead.)
“The tweet from Mark Latham last night is a disgrace,racist and totally unacceptable,” said Darren Wick,Nine’s director of news and current affairs.