Rita Panahi was born in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, USA in 1976. Her mother was a midwife and her father was an agricultural engineer; they were from Iran. They returned to Iran during her infancy, living on the coast and moving to Tehran by 1979. Her mother worked for a hospital associated with the Shah during the Iranian Revolution. Panahi describes her parents as 'relaxed Muslims who were not particularly political'. However, her family was targeted by the repressive Islamic regime of the Ayatollah Khomeini. In 1984, they were accepted by Australia as refugees and lived in Melbourne. Panahi worked in banking while attending Monash University, studying but not completing a Bachelor of Business Finance. She joined Australian Young Labor and volunteered in the 1996 election campaign. Panahi worked as a personal banker at Colonial Mutual and was the youngest branch manager in the company's history. She has a child and is a single mother at present.
Journalism career
Panahi initially wrote for the daily newspaper mX, writing a weekly sports gossip column. Her column was picked up for a second year and by 2007 she was a regular guest on the AM sports radio stationSEN. She earned her MBA from Swinburne. In September 2007, Panahi began working for the Herald Sun, published by the Herald and Weekly Times, a subsidiary of News Corp Australia. Panahi is also a regular guest on Sky News and Sunrise on the Seven Network. She is also a radio commentator on 3AW and 2GB. Panahi is described as a conservative. She has argued against the burqa but opposes banning it. She critcizes parts of Islam, but opposes a ban on Muslim immigration. She supports offshore detention camps for illegal immigrants, as well as asylum seekers who arrive to Australia by boat. She has been described as 'surprisingly' progressive on some social issues. Writing for SBS, Margaret Simons observed that Panahi hates homophobia and has argued in favour of women choosing single motherhood, as she has. In January 2015, Panahi sparred with Andrew O'Keefe on Weekend Sunrise over Islamic extremists. Her article prompted a response on news website New Matilda. In a debate over racism in early 2016, Panahi was on a team opposing ABC presenter Stan Grant. Panahi argued that Australia should not be characterised as racist. In January 2017, Panahi was encouraged by Michael Kroger to stand for Liberal Party pre-selection in the Victorian state electorate of Frankston. In March 2018, Panahi began hosting The Friday Show on Sky News Live.
