The Labor candidate took the remaining WA Senate spot in the final election tally, which has taken more than four weeks to complete.
New WA Senator Fatima Payman is an Australian Muslim with cultural roots from Afghanistan. Source: AAP / RICHARD WAINWRIGHT/AAPIMAGE
Fatima Payman has won Western Australia’s sixth and final Senate seat, becoming the first Afghan Australian and the first hijab-wearing Muslim woman in parliament.
She is the state’s only new senator, after Labor senators Sue Lines and Glenn Sterle were re-elected, along with Liberal senators Michaelia Cash and Dean Smith.
The final seat is held by Green senator Dorinda Cox, who in 2021 became the first Indigenous woman to represent WA in the Senate.
Ms Payman arrived as a refugee from Afghanistan with her parents and three siblings, before growing up in Perth’s northern suburbs.
She is passionate about equality and understanding when it comes to youth and culturally diverse communities.
Ms Payman’s election in WA takes Labor’s numbers to 26. The party now requires one minor party or independent vote on top of the Greens’ 12 votes to pass legislation in the upper house with 39 votes required.
