Pauline Hanson has issued two rare and somewhat grudging apologies, one to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese after criticising his late mother's decades in public housing, and another regarding remarks calling Indigenous Australians the "most primitive race on Earth" who had "achieved nothing". The climbdowns matter because One Nation is no longer a fringe protest movement but a rising political force positioning itself as an alternative to the major parties, meaning Hanson's combative style is now under far greater scrutiny than in the past, with critics arguing she is too abrasive to be trusted in government.

Albanese responded emotionally, saying "kindness isn't weakness" and accusing Hanson of "nastiness and spitefulness", while Liberal MP Andrew Hastie said the comments showed she was unfit to be prime minister and that mothers should be off-limits in political attacks. Commentator Peter van Onselen argues Hanson's underlying point, that public housing tenancies should be periodically reassessed rather than automatically becoming lifetime homes, was defensible policy, but that she wrongly targeted Albanese's mother, Maryanne, a single mother with severe rheumatoid arthritis who died in 2002 and could not respond. Her comments about Indigenous Australians, by contrast, are described as offering "less room for sympathy", with Hanson explaining she meant to compare Indigenous societies at a particular historical point rather than make a blanket claim.