VANGUARD - Expressing the viewpoint of the Communist Party of Australia (Marxist-Leninist)
For National Independence and Socialism • www.cpaml.org
Ciccone (3rd left) meeting on June 29 with members of Nuclear for Australia. Source Senator Raff Ciccone Facebook page
Widespread opposition to the pro-US policy orientation of the Labor Party has focussed on the leading triumvirate of Albanese, Wong and Marles.
To them can be added the three State Premiers of WA, SA and NSW who are complicit in the AUKUS arrangements and the restrictions of civil liberties associated with the anti-war and pro-Palestinian mass movements.
Being groomed for a more prominent future role is Victorian Senator Raff Ciccone.
After graduating from university, Ciccone initially worked in financial planning before moving into industrial relations and employment law, later becoming a senior official in the right-wing Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Association (SDA). Like too many other union officials, he had not come through the rank-and-file and the workplace, but was recruited from outside the membership.
Having joined the Labor Party at 16, his stint at the SDA provided a path towards employment with Senator Jacinta Collins who had herself been employed by the SDA for 15 years. When she retired in 2019 to take up the position of national executive director of the National Catholic Education Commission on the same day, Ciccone was nominated to fill the casual vacancy.
Wolverines
In 2020, Ciccone posted a sticker of claw marks outside his parliamentary office. It was a public declaration of his acceptance of membership in the “Wolverines”, a collective of far-right politicians committed to the most hawkish pro-US and anti-China politics. Other members include former PM and current President of the Liberal Party Tony Abbott, Andrew Hastie, James Patterson, Tim Wilson and the Nationals’ Matt Canavan.
Ciccone is an advocate of Taiwanese independence and attended the Presidential inauguration of Lai Ching-te in May 2024. On July 8, he personally met and farewelled Douglas Hsu, representative of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Australia, who was returning home. Ciccone is a member of the anti-China, pro-Taiwan Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, an international, cross-party alliance of parliamentarians from 43 countries. Andrew Hastie was a founding member, and James Patterson has been a co-Chair. Tiawan is a member, recognised as the Republic of Taiwan.
Zionist supporter
During the 2023 parliamentary winter break, Ciccone visited Israel hosted by the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council. On June 19, despite Zionism’s genocidal war against the Palestinians, he attended a function of the Council of Australian Jewry to celebrate the 78th anniversary of Israel’s independence. Seventy-eight years of colonisation, apartheid and genocide not a thing to celebrate, but he was happy to do it.
This was no surprise and followed his March 31 call, as chair of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, for US imperialism and Israeli Zionism to “finish the job” in their joint war of aggression against Iran. “It’s important that the US and Israel are able to, in some ways, finish the job and actually target the regime…” he said.
Fossil fool
Ciccone is no environmentalist. He is a strong supporter of the timber industry and criticised the Labor government in Victoria for its decision to phase out native forest harvesting by 2030. He is connected to a pro-fossil fuel grouping of some 20 Labor MPs, known as the Otis Group, and has argued against the ALP's opposition to nuclear power in Australia.
On 28 November 2025, he welcomed the give-away of Australian critical minerals and rare earths in the deal done by Labor and the US. He said “The landmark $13 billion critical minerals and rare earths framework signed last month by Australia and the United States represents a pivotal moment in our alliance…(and will) strengthen our economic and strategic partnership with the US.”
Supports the US stranglehold
Following the 2022 federal election, Ciccone became Government Deputy Whip in the Senate and was elected Chair of the Senate Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Legislation Committee. He has aggressively argued the case for the US Alliance and AUKUS in articles for ASPI (otherwise known as Australians Serving Predatory Imperialism).
In August 2025, fresh from having “the privilege of attending the Australian American Leadership Dialogue in Adelaide”, he wrote in “Alliance that goes far beyond AUKUS”, that the Australia-US relationship “is one of our most valuable assets. Its strength lies not only in defence cooperation, but in the deep trust, shared values and people-to-people connections that underpin it.”
“…it’s our shared values that sustain our friendship. Our relationship is built on freedom, the rule of law, human rights and a commitment to a rules-based international order.”
He praised the commissioning of the USS Canberra in Sydney Harbour in 2023 because it “marked the first time a US Navy ship entered service in a foreign port”, and celebrated the test-firing of a Precision Strike Missile co-developed with the US during the 2025 Talisman Sabre Exercises.
He wrote that the US “treats Australia much like a domestic partner within the US defence trade system”, although it would be closer to the truth to say that the US treats Australia as a “domestic part” of its military-industrial complex.
Ciccone has been unleashed as the Labor triumvirate’s attack dog against the public inquiry into AUKUS. In a June 26, 2026 article published by ASPI titled “Nuclear submarines: bolt-cutters to ensure Australia is never wrapped in chains”, he wrote:
There are those whose foreign policy beliefs were shaped in a more benign era. Distinguished voices now animated by nostalgia are based in tragic and dramatic claims about the very purpose of AUKUS on the strategic needs of the past. With respect to these voices, the world has changed. Our region has changed and, as we speak, military modernisation across the Indo-Pacific continues at pace. Australia must respond to the world as it exists today and not as it existed in the past. Some of these voices have decided to form a so-called independent public inquiry into AUKUS. Although its contributors are certainly not lacking in experience, it is difficult to say what they expect to achieve.
Ciccone represents within the Labor Party that group of willing servants of US imperialism who continue to betray our national independence and sovereignty to a foreign state.
That state actually controls our state though a web of interlocking influence and pressure comprising its economic domination, its military presence, its control of media-shaping culture and influence over opinions and values, and its diplomatic and political ties to local politicians.
The Ciccones of this world accept that state of affairs and seek to perpetuate it. They often stand against the rank-and-file members of the ALP amongst whom there is a strong anti-war sentiment, a determination to support civil liberties and democratic rights, and a desire for a greater capacity for independence in matters of foreign policy. But control from the top ensures that right-wing influence goes deep within Labor.
For our part, we stand for genuine anti-imperialist independence and socialism.
Labor’s rank-and-file must play their part in fighting Labor’s Ciccones and working for the movement for independence and socialism in their work places and communities.