Sam Dastyari (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Iwatch the results of the US presidential primary elections and I shudder with fear. Let us not pussyfoot around this, a Donald Trump or a Ted Cruz presidency will undermine many of the fundamental values that Australia and America share. I do not share the values of an extreme, right-wing, isolationist United States, and neither do most Australians. I do not believe in vilifying Muslims, in softening gun laws, in limiting women's rights or in international military adventurism. Frankly, it does not matter whether we are talking about a Donald Trump or a Ted Cruz, the same right-wing extremist ideology is driving the United States conservative debate.

America has strong democratic institutions, and I am well aware that American elections are decisions for American voters—and American voters alone. But if America chooses a path of xenophobia and plutocracy, we should not, indeed we must not, follow them. We must stay true to our own values—tolerance, multiculturalism, inclusion and respect.

I was born in Sari, a small town in northern Iran. My mum and dad brought me to Australia when I was five. They wanted lives of freedom, opportunity and hope. Above all they wanted to give me the chance to grow up in a safe and peaceful country, a nation free of Islamist tyranny. The American ideals that helped shape western values—life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness—are currently under assault from an extreme, right-wing ideology, an ideology that is determined to divide the United States against itself. This ideology is made stronger when the likes of former Prime Minister Tony Abbott and former defence minister Kevin Andrews go abroad to endorse these views.

On the eve of the Second World War, President Roosevelt warned that four freedoms were at stake: the freedom of speech, freedom of worship, freedom from want and freedom from fear. This was a vision shared by all Americans, and all Australians, whatever their political differences.

In Australia we live in a country of prosperity, a country of freedom, neighbouring the world's largest Muslim nation, Indonesia. There is no doubt we have been living through a long period of American global leadership, and we have prospered from it. So when I hear Ted Cruz talk about the ills of immigration I fear for our future. When I hear Donald Trump talk about banning Muslims from entering America I am close to despair. Extremist, populist, right-wing rhetoric may have short-term political appeal, but it is damaging the rest of the world. An America which cannot accept freedom of worship is not the America I know. It is not the America I love. It is not the America we love. It is hardly America at all.

The friendship between our nations is stronger than any individual and should endure any American or Australian leader. But if this is the year that America chooses intolerance and disrespect, hate and fear, we will all be weaker for it. In his farewell address to a grateful nation, Ronald Reagan spoke of a shining city:

… a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans … And if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here.

That is the America that Australians know and love. It is the America we have looked at without inhibitions of any kind, without pangs of affection or kinship. The America of the four freedoms and the 'shining city on the hill', the America of Roosevelt and Reagan, is being severely tested this election year. When America changes, the world changes. I am an Australian senator born to Iranian immigrants. Look at my face and ask yourself this: would I be welcome in a Ted Cruz or Donald Trump America?