Wednesday 10 August 2022 05:10 PM Peter FitzSimons, Jacinta Price: Read the explosive text messages over ... trends now

Peter FitzSimons and Jacinta Price both furiously insisted they had witnesses backing their accounts of a phone interview in which the new senator claims the left-wing author was 'rude' and 'aggressive' towards her.

Daily Mail Australia has obtained the furious text messages FitzSimons exchanged with the Country Liberals senator for the Northern Territory in the wake of the interview being published in the Nine's newspapers on Sunday.

Ms Price has gone public saying she felt FitzSimons - the husband of TV host Lisa Wilkinson - 'imposed' his view on her during their chat about the merits and faults of the Voice to Parliament. 

In a Facebook post after the article was published, Senator Price alleged FitzSimons 'accused me of giving racists a voice but that wasn't printed' and later told media he was 'aggressive' and 'rude' and shouted at her.

FitzSimons strongly denies her claims - as does his boss, who tweeted that he had listened to the interview - with FitzSimons texting asking her to remove the Facebook post, which she did.

The full text exchange between the pair shows they both claimed to have witnesses to the phone call as they argued over what happened.

'Senator, I urge you to withdraw these defamatory accusations, as you know it is nonsense,' FitzSimons wrote.

Senator Price hit back: 'We did yell at each other. I'd like a copy of the interview... you did accuse me of empowering racists.' 

FitzSimons insisted there was 'not a single raised voice on either side' but she replied: 'I recall I had to yell, as did my chief of staff who was present while you were on speaker.'    

The author responded by saying: 'I have a witness at my end as well. But it doesn't matter. It is all recorded.'

FitzSimons again asked her to withdraw her allegations before Senator Price ended the argument by replying: 'Please stop bullying me. 

'I don't ever want to communicate with you again.' 

Senator Price and FitzSimons originally chatted to discuss Anthony Albanese's proposal to change the constitution to establish a Voice to Parliament, a group of Aboriginal people that would advise politicians on policies for Indigenous people.

FitzSimons is in favour while Senator Price is against, believing it will not help improve the lives of Aboriginal people. 

After FitzSimons denied being rude to Senator Price, she urged him to release the recording of the interview so the public could make up their own minds.

'I'm quite happy for him to release the recordings if that will just settle things,' she told Daily Mail Australia.

'It's been a bit of a drain and there's obviously a lot of more important issues that I want to focus on and get to work on as a new senator. It's been a not-so-welcome distraction,' she said of their dispute.

'My idea of more respectful and effective journalism is to have conversations about issues without having the opinions of a journalist imposed upon you and being made to feel as though you're somehow wrong or incorrect.

Senator Price said it is wrong for journalists or commentators to be surprised when an Aboriginal person speaks out against the Voice to Parliament.

'There has been a racial stereotype created around how Aboriginal Australians think and act and behave and we don't generalise in that way about white Australians, or Italian Australians or Asia Australians,' she said.

'So why should we continually have that way of thinking imposed upon us as Indigenous Australians? Again it is a racial stereotype and I won't have a bar of it.'

Senator Price said people need to be more accepting of diverse views within the Aboriginal community.

'The narrative that we are a country of oppressed people and oppressors - we've got to get away from that. It's not helpful, it's not constructive,' she said.

'It provides for a very narrow view of how we are as a diverse bunch of Australians and we've got to take it back to basics of what it means to be human.'

Senator Price said the Voice the Parliament is a bad idea because it will entrench the idea that Aboriginal people are all victims.

'Enshrining it in the Constitution suggests that as a race we're forever going to be in need of special measures and as a race what somehow defines us is being marginalised,' she said.

'But it's not race that determines our marginalisation - there are those of us of Indigenous heritage who are doing really well, we're fine and have managed to take advantage of the modern world to live successful lives.'   

FitzSimons said he only confronted Senator Price over 'mistruths' and that he gave her views a fair airing his column.

'What I sought to do was have her correct the record on the nature of our interview, which she partially did by deleting the post, and acknowledging to me I was not shouting... 

'As to suggestions of bullying… simply not true. The senator posted a complete and demonstrable untruth. I called her out on it, and she took down the post,' he said.

FitzSimons has not directly responded to Price's challenge to release the recordings.

However, his boss, Sydney Morning Herald editor Bevan Shields, said on Wednesday evening: I've listened to audio of the full interview between Peter FitzSimons and Senator Price. There was no yelling and no shouting from either participant. 

'This was an interesting interview in which the senator's positions and views were tested.

'It's worth noting that Peter provided Senator Price with a transcript of what he proposed to publish in his column and she approved it. 

'She also deleted her initial Facebook post about the interview. '

One is a private school boy and Wallaby turned author from Sydney's north shore... the other an Alice Springs-raised daughter of a Warlpiri woman who may become PM: Why the backgrounds of Jacinta Price and Peter FitzSimons matter in their VERY public spat

By Stephen Gibbs for Daily Mail Australia 

Peter FitzSimons believes he is an expert on the identity of Indigenous people and what they want for themselves, as he once showed in a series of text messages to Daily Mail Australia.

Following publication of a story about his then latest book, a biography of British explorer James Cook, the columnist took time to

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