Embattled Energy Minister Angus Taylor has now demanded an apology from American feminist author Naomi Wolf for suggesting he was anti-Semitic.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
"Her accusation of antisemitism is wrong and deeply offensive to me and my family," Mr Taylor told parliament responding to Dr Wolf releasing a video of a late-night call with an unnamed staffer in Mr Taylor's office.
"My grandmother was Jewish and my belief in Judeo-Christian values is deeply held. I call for her to apologise for these unsubstantiated and outrageous accusations."
Dr Wolf hit back immediately, tweeting:
She later told ABC TV that Mr Taylor's story suggesting she was involved in a war on Christmas in Oxford in 1991 was thoroughly false from beginning to end.
Dr Wolf has become embroiled in the controversies that have dogged Mr Taylor over recent weeks after stories re-emerged of his inaugural speech to Parliament in 2014 in which he invoked the leftist feminist author in the context of political correctness gone mad.
Mr Taylor told parliament in that speech that he had lived down the hall from Dr Wolf at Oxford in 1991. And he implied that Dr Wolf had been among "shrill elitist voices" campaigning against having a Christmas tree in a case of "insidious political correctness".
Dr Wolf rejected the story. She hadn't been an Oxford in 1991 and she hadn't campaigned against Christmas, she tweeted on Monday, accusing Mr Taylor of dog-whistle politics.
On Wednesday night, she called his office to demand an apology, and videoed the 29-minute call with an unnamed staffer, who told her that Mr Taylor had not suggested she had campaigned against Christmas.
This is what Mr Taylor said in the 2014 speech: "I first encountered political correctness as a student at Oxford. It was 1991, and a young Naomi Wolf lived a couple of doors down the corridor. Several graduate students, mostly from the north-east of the US, decided we should abandon the Christmas tree in the common room because some people might be offended. I was astounded."
But the staffer insisted, "Mr Taylor thinks you were in Oxford. You would have to have that conversation with him."
And in question time on Thursday, Mr Taylor held the line: "I recall seeing and meeting Ms Wolf at New College in Oxford during my time there.
She began her studies there in the mid-80s and she finished at Oxford only a couple of years ago. Now my speech to the parliament six years ago did not say she was involved in the war on Christmas."
She described her phone call with the minister's office as "surreal". The staffer repeatedly asked her to put her request for a correction in writing so she could receive a written response, but she refused, saying she wanted the record corrected publicly.
"I do not want to be invoked in a maiden speech among campaigners against Christmas because I never supported that, I don't believe it. It's not true. There's nothing true about it. It's not a matter of dispute, my whereabouts in 1991 are completely public."
She also accused Mr Taylor of "a really gross misuse" of her name and reputation in an ethnically divisive attacked, and suggested he was playing on her Jewish background to imply that Jews are anti-Christmas.
Mr Taylor has now demanded that she apologise for suggesting he was anti-Semitic, given his family background.
His staffer also raised his background in the call, telling Dr Wolf, "The minister's grandparents are Jewish. On his maternal side they are Jewish."
Mr Taylor also faces renewed pressure over the Jam Land case involving the potentially illegal clearing of native grasslands on a property he now part owns, including with his brother after a Greens-led Senate inquiry case found Mr Taylor had used his position to obtain special treatment for his family, a claim rejected by the Coaltion.