He is arguably the most divisive figure in Malcolm Turnbull's government: Immigration Minister Peter Dutton, the Queensland cop turned political warrior who controls the country's borders with an iron fist.
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Is this our next Prime Minister?
As Malcolm Turnbull flounders in the polls, Peter Dutton is being mentioned as a possible leader.
Touted in some circles as the next Liberal Party leader and possibly prime minister, Mr Dutton nonetheless faces an uphill (and expensive) battle in the most basic of MPs' duties: retaining his seat of Dickson in Queensland.
With his margin slashed at the last election to just 1.6 per cent, left-wing activists have sniffed their opportunity to dispatch their conservative bête noir.
But the Liberal National Party is digging in to save Mr Dutton, asking the Australian Electoral Commission to redraw the electoral map to his benefit at the expense of surrounding seats and MPs.
Progressive lobby group GetUp has raised a war chest of almost $225,000 in just one week to be unleashed against Mr Dutton in a campaign of doorknocking, robo-calls and giant billboards.
"We really see him as a threat to our democracy," GetUp director Paul Oosting said. "We see his views as very extreme and even at odds with the views of many Coalition voters."
Photo: GetUp
Mr Oosting, above, said GetUp's foot soldiers will focus on local issues relevant to voters, such as schools, climate change and funding for public institutions like the ABC - rather than Mr Dutton's refugee policies.
But a confident Mr Dutton told Fairfax Media he had been inundated with support, eliciting commitments of $650,000 to buttress his own campaign since GetUp's announcement.
"If GetUp want a fight, they'll get one," he said, describing the lobby group as a "front" for the Greens, Labor and the militant Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union. "I don't intend to lose to GetUp."
The seat of Dickson will be a focal point in the crucial battleground of Queensland, where Labor leader Bill Shorten has campaigned tirelessly this year. The state is likely to decide the election outcome.
In its submission to a forthcoming redistribution, the Queensland LNP has proposed adding conservative areas into Dickson, in order to bring about an "improved community of interest".
The move would benefit Mr Dutton, but at the expense of improving the party's position in neighbouring Longman – which it lost at the last election – and Petrie, which Luke Howarth holds by just 1.65 per cent.
Mr Dutton has enraged progressives in his tenure as the hard-line immigration minister responsible for Australia's offshore detention of refugees, as well as his role as the leading social conservative in Coalition ranks.
He suffered a 5.12 per cent swing against him at last year's election. If a further 1500 voters changed their minds, it would be goodnight Gracie for the man touted as a future PM.
A Galaxy poll in April put the two-party preferred vote in Queensland at 50-50 and found Mr Dutton would be among seven Coalition MPs in the state to lose their seats if the results were replicated on polling day.
But senator Ian Macdonald, a senior figure in the Queensland LNP, remained optimistic about Mr Dutton's prospects.
"I don't think he's in any trouble," he said. "If he's looking for money I'll give him $100 because he's doing a good job."
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