Cairns Council Election Candidate Appears In Videos With Nazi Flag

A man from Far North Queensland, aspiring to become a local councillor, has been featured in multiple videos with a Nazi flag.

Shane Cuthbert, an independent candidate in next year’s Cairns Regional Council election, said the YouTub videos of him with a Nazi flag in the background were “not indicative of who I am”.

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Mr Cuthbert told ABC he planned to remove the videos and said it was “not a good look”.

However, the Cairns council election candidate still keeps some of the videos online.

Mr Cuthbert delivered online speeches in a series of life coaching-style videos posted to YouTube in December 2019 with a large Nazi flag on a pole in the background.

The videos covered various topics, including discussions on former stockbroker Jordan Belfort, the evolving roles of men and women, and childhood trauma.

Channel 7 reported on Mr Cuthbert’s online history in March last year, where he reportedly informed the journalist that the flag was not his, nor was the location where he filmed.

He informed ABC that after the Channel 7 interview, he attempted to delete the videos from his account but acknowledged that he didn’t remove them all, considering it “another oversight”.

“It’s not a good look, no,” he said.

“It’s definitely, certainly not indicative of who I am as a person. I think the work that I do in the community, especially Indigenous communities, especially with Indigenous youth at the moment, I think it paints a very different picture.

“All I can really say to that is: it’s not my flag, I don’t own it, it was not my premises.

“At the time, it was a shop that sold a bunch of old, cool stuff, and look I just thought it looked cool. Not the flag. But just the background of the store and the colours and things like that.

“I just thought this is an interesting, eye-catching spot to film a video.”

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