Greens scramble to replace Adam Bandt after humiliating defeat
The party faces a leadership crisis as radical contenders emerge to replace Adam Bandt after his shock election loss.
The Greens are scrambling to find a new leader following Adam Bandt’s embarrassing loss of his Melbourne seat in a devastating election wipeout, with the only serious contenders seen as extreme and divisive figures.
With Bandt out of parliament, the party is facing its first contested leadership ballot in years — and it’s shaping up to be a fierce battle between long-time controversial figures like Mehreen Faruqi and Sarah Hanson-Young.
Faruqi, a senator from New South Wales and close Bandt ally, has yet to declare her candidacy but is expected to run. She told The Project last week: “We will sit down and talk to our colleagues, our members and our supporters, and we will think about a strategy.”
🇦🇺 If Adam Bandt loses his seat & Mehreen Faruqi leads the Greens, what a gift to us all
— Katherine Deves Morgan 🇦🇺🚺 (@deves_katherine) May 5, 2025
Her extremist leftist ideology & unedifying performances in the Chamber could further sink the party
She’s accused almost everyone of racism —all her former workplaces, the Australian… pic.twitter.com/KXZm9pe2sp
“I don’t accept that the people of Australia don’t want us in the lower house. We have many seats in state parliaments, and we still have one in federal parliament.”
Faruqi, who led a Senate walkout over Gaza and accused Labor senators of being “gutless, heartless cowards”, is aligned with the activist wing of the party and would likely inflame tensions with Jewish groups if chosen to lead.
Zionist Federation of Australia president Jeremy Liebler said: “Australians have witnessed the Greens, led by Adam Bandt and Mehreen Faruqi, peddle dangerous antisemitic conspiracy theories, spew anti-Israel rhetoric, fail to call out terrorism and demonise the Jewish community.”
Hanson-Young, the party’s longest-serving MP, is considered a potential pivot away from Bandt’s combative style. She has unsuccessfully run for deputy leadership multiple times but is viewed as a more pragmatic figure, especially in working with Labor.
Adam Bandt's defeat is a joy.
— Alexandra Marshall (@ellymelly) May 7, 2025
Even better, the prospect of Mehreen Faruqi as leader.
How many old school environmentalists envisioned their tree-hugging party as an Islamic-centric, rainforest-bulldozing, communist machine???
Greens defence spokesman David Shoebridge has ruled out running for the top job, saying: “Yes, we could have taken a much more watered-down package to the election, but it wouldn’t have been honest to the state of the challenges that we see Australia and the world has to face.”
The leadership ballot is expected on Thursday, but a Greens source admitted the party was floundering: “It’s always been a stage-managed handover, but now there is no leader to hand over. Everyone is trying to figure out what to do.”
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