CANBERRA — The Australian federal government banned the National Socialist Network, also known as White Australia, as a prohibited hate group under legislation passed after December's Bondi beach terror attack. The ban was set to take effect at the end of Friday.

The legislation was enacted in response to an antisemitic attack on a Hanukkah celebration at Sydney's Bondi Beach in December in which 15 people were killed. Listing the group makes supporting, funding, training, recruiting, and joining it a criminal offense punishable by up to 15 years in prison.

The National Socialist Network is the second group designated under the hate laws, after Hizb ut-Tahrir was banned in March. Under the law, the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation decides whether an organization meets the threshold for designation and a government minister must approve the prohibition. Criteria include that an organization's behavior could increase the risk of violence and that it has advocated for or engaged in hate crimes. ASIO recommended in April that the government consider listing White Australia as a hate group.

The group declared it would disband in the hours before the legislation was introduced at a special January sitting of parliament. A post to its Telegram channel in January said it would dissolve to avoid arrests of members.

"The National Socialist Network changed their name, but didn't change the fact that they were still an organization and were still engaging in the same sort of behavior that met the thresholds for this legislation," Minister for Home Affairs Tony Burke told reporters in Canberra. He said the group had instead "phoenixed" and its members had continued organising. In April, the group lodged an application with the Australian Electoral Commission to register as a political party.

Burke and ASIO head Mike Burgess said the groups operated in a "lawful but awful" manner, skirting the higher threshold to be listed as a terror organisation. "None of this will stop bigoted people from having horrific ideologies, but it does prevent this group from organising, from meeting, and prevents some of the sorts of horrific bigoted rallies that we've seen around our country," Burke said.

Solicitor Matthew Hopkins filed a legal challenge in the High Court of Australia against the commonwealth over the law used to enforce the ban, acting on behalf of Thomas Sewell and the White Australia Party. Court documents state that on 13 January, the National Socialist Network and the Australian European Movement disbanded voluntarily, but that the White Australia Party did not dissolve and that Sewell is the party's president.

The group argues in court documents that the law burdens the freedom of governmental and political communication and violates the constitution by conferring punitive power to the government without judicial review. It also argues the commonwealth lacks the power to proscribe a political party, contravening the Australian Communist Party v Commonwealth decision of 1951.

"The challenged provisions, in short, operates as a doorway to tyranny, by empowering the executive to name, suppress and criminalise political opponents and opposing views," Sewell and the White Australia Party state in court documents. The group has submitted an application requesting that the court issue an order restraining the commonwealth from using the law until a determination is made.