Tasmanian Liberal Party candidate Jessica Whelan has resigned after making anti-Muslim comments on social media.
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Ms Whelan, the candidate for the seat of Lyons, campaigned alongside Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Thursday but claimed another set of controversial comments about women had been doctored, prompting Mr Morrison to say her allegations would be forwarded to the Australian Federal Police.
The press conference resulted in farcical scenes with Ms Whelan refusing to answer questions, leaving Mr Morrison to defend her.
But further posts in which Ms Whelan made anti-Muslim and anti-immigration comments came to light overnight.
Coalition campaign spokesman Simon Birmingham said on Friday morning Ms Whelan would be disendorsed as the candidate for Lyons later in the day.
"I can say in relation to this candidate more information has come to light overnight. As a result of that, the state executive of the Liberal Party in Tasmania will be taking steps to deal with this candidate," Senator Birmingham told Channel Nine.
"I expect, based on information that has come to light overnight, the additional information, that she'll not continue to be a Liberal candidate."
Senator Birmingham described Ms Whelan's posts as "racist comments" and said the Liberal Party would not tolerate her views.
"We won't accept that. [Prime Minister] Scott Morrison has taken a strong stance in this regard," he said.
The Liberal Party later released a statement saying Ms Whelan had resigned.
"Clearly these posts are inappropriate, and the Liberal Party was not aware of their existence until they were reported. Therefore, she has offered her resignation as a candidate and the Liberal Party has accepted it," it said.
"Jess Whelan vehemently maintains that she did not make the vulgar post reported in yesterday's media," this morning's statement said, referring to the post about American feminists and genital mutilation which prompted the questions at Ms Whelan's press conference with Mr Morrison.
"However, she accepts that she has made some of the other posts in question."
With just two weeks to go until election day, the Tasmanian Liberal Party has urged people to instead vote for the Nationals' candidate, Deanna Hutchinson.
Ms Whelan's resignation is the latest in a string of candidate controversies, many of which have been prompted by historical comments on social media sites.
Victorian Liberal candidate Peter Killin resigned from the party on Wednesday after secretly attacking Tim Wilson, a gay Victorian Liberal MP, online, calling for party members to do more to prevent gays from being elected.
Labor's candidate for Melbourne, Luke Creasey, also faced questions about his past social media comments as a Facebook post emerged where he appeared to suggest a lesbian couple end up sharing a single vagina.
Labor is refusing to disendorse Mr Creasey who has already been forced to apologise for sharing a rape joke and pornographic material on his Facebook page in 2012.
Senator Birmingham said the Labor Party had "double standards" and called for Mr Creasey to be disendorsed.
On Monday, another Labor candidate, Wayne Kurnoth, was forced to quit the party over anti-Semitic social media posts and conspiracy theories including that the world is secretly controlled by an alien race of Jewish lizard shape-shifters, mythological beings able to change their physical forms at will.
- SMH/The Age
