Katie Hopkins Deported, Fined After Breaching Australian Quarantine Laws

British far-right media personality and commentator Katie Hopkins, known for her polarising and controversial views, has been fined by the New South Wales...

Katie Hopkins (credit: Getty Images)
Getty

Image via Getty

Katie Hopkins (credit: Getty Images)

British far-right media personality and commentator Katie Hopkins, known for her polarising and controversial views, has been fined and deported by the New South Wales police force.

Hopkins had her Australian visa cancelled and is set to face deportation after a crude social media video surfaced online. The 46-year-old supposedly flew out to Sydney, Australia, to appear on the show Big Brother VIP. In response to the Australian government hotel quarantine laws, Hopkins went on Instagram Live to call their COVID-19 restrictions “the greatest hoax in human history” while joking about breaching quarantine protocol by parading around naked and maskless in hopes of frightening hotel security. The live footage was later re-uploaded to YouTube, where officials caught wind of Hopkins’ behaviour.

As you can imagine, Hopkins’ words infuriated many Australians, as their number of entrants into the country was halved last week in response to the Delta variant of the coronavirus. In Hopkins’ lengthy, now-deleted video, she criticised the New South Wales premier, Gladys Berejiklian, and the Premier of Victoria, Daniel Andrews, insulting their character and appearance and mocking their Australian accents.

According to Australia’s immigration laws, they hold discretionary authority to refuse the entry of people they deem to be of bad character. When asked directly if they thought Hopkins was of the good character, before her outburst, despite knowing her history of social tyranny, Mr Andrews claimed Hopkins was “clearly not someone that we want to keep in this country for a second longer than we have to.”

The New South Wales health minister, Brad Hazzard, said: “I was shocked to see that lady—who, fortuitously, I’ve never heard of before and I hope to never hear of again. To think she could think that the measures we are taking to keep our community safe can be treated with such juvenile, imbecilic behaviour is just mind-boggling. To think that she could put our teams in our health quarantine, our staff… To think that she thinks it is acceptable to put them at risk and to put our broader community at risk is completely abhorrent, and I hope she is on the first plane back.”

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