Far-right leader banned from Sydney's Australia Day events posed 'serious risk to safety': police

"NSW Police have banned White Australian Men from celebrating Australia Day in Sydney, Australia," reads a post shared on social media platform X here on January 26, 2024.

It was shared on Australia Day by Jacob Hersant, a user with more than 3,200 followers who local media has described as the self-proclaimed leader of far-right neo-Nazi group the National Socialist Network (archived link).

The contentious holiday marks the date when European settlers arrived in Sydney Harbour in 1788, which Indigenous activists say heralded the start of a centuries-long campaign of cultural genocide.

Hersant's post includes a video of a police officer telling a man that he cannot enter parts of Sydney or anywhere with planned Australia Day events.

"I believe your presence in the Sydney city local government area poses a serious risk to public safety," the police officer tells the man.

Image

Screenshot of the misleading claim, captured on February 2, 2024

Similar claims were shared more than 800 times elsewhere on X here, as well as by a UK-based YouTube channel here.

A US-based Facebook user shared another similar claim here that "White Australian patriots" had been banned from the national day celebrations."

Comments on the posts suggest users believed the claims.

"It's literally the Australian police saying you can't celebrate Australia," read one comment.

Another said: "Australia has Fallen. The once proud nation is no longer. When you are not allowed to Celebrate. Well maybe you can in your backyard this year."

Public safety order

The video attached to the posts shows the ban was targeted at a specific individual and was not a blanket ban on all "White Australian Men".

In the video, the police officer explains that he is serving a public safety order -- an order issued by a senior police officer that bans someone from attending an event or entering an area during a specific time (archived link).

The officer explains that the ban is based on the man's ideological links, criminal history and "goal of intimidating and provoking people".

"You must remain out of the Sydney city local government area or anywhere that there is an Australia Day event planned for 2024 until 23:59 hours, today being the 26th of January 2024," he says.

When the man suggests "we're not allowed to celebrate Australia", the officer responds: "Well, I suggest you could do it at your house, at a barbecue or something, but not at an event."

A reverse image search on Google led to local media reports about police confronting a "Neo-Nazi leader" and banning them from the holiday events.

The Sydney Morning Herald newspaper included a screenshot from the video and identified the man as Thomas Sewell (archived link).

The newspaper reported that Sewell was part of a "group of dozens of black-clad men detained at North Sydney station".

It said officers stopped a group of heavily disguised men at the North Sydney train station, and arrested six people.

According to The Guardian newspaper, Sewell was sentenced to an 18-month community corrections order with 150 hours of community service in 2023 for attacking a security guard of Nine Network news organisation in 2021 (archived link).

The Guardian also reported Sewell and Hersant were also convicted in 2023 after attacking a group of hikers in a Victoria state park in 2021 (archived link). 

Sewell shared on his X account a photo of a piece of paper with text matching the public safety order read to him by the police officer.