In the wake of the Bondi terror attack, the Prime Minister invited Israeli President Isaac Herzog to Australia, a move framed as an act of solidarity with the Jewish community. But that visit, which begins on Sunday, is now sparking criticism, including from within the government, with a series of protests planned across the country. Supporters of the visit say Herzog’s presence will bring comfort to grieving families. But critics argue it risks deepening divides, particularly as Israel faces ge...
Feb 05, 2026•16 min•Ep. 1810
Between them, the US and Russia hold 90 per cent of the world’s nuclear firepower. But today, the New START Treaty, which limits the number of missiles and warheads in their arsenals, expires. President Putin first suspended it two years ago. Now, without a last-minute deal, it looks set to collapse for good amid fears of a new nuclear arms race. Today, a view from the inside as we speak with Paul Dean – who helped implement the Treaty and is now a Vice President for the US-based ‘Nuclear Threat...
Feb 04, 2026•13 min•Ep. 1809
For years, survivors of some of the worst crimes imaginable have been put through hell. Their perpetrators allowed to use glowing character references in court, in an effort to have their sentences reduced. But today, that’s set to change as New South Wales introduces new laws scrapping character references for all criminal sentencing - in response to years of campaigning from sexual abuse survivors. Today, ‘Your Reference Ain’t Relevant’ Cofounder Harrison James on what these changes mean and h...
Feb 03, 2026•13 min•Ep. 1808
When the US military seized Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, people in Colombia were left wondering if they were next. Almost immediately, Donald Trump was accusing Colombia’s president, Gustavo Petro, of being tied to cocaine trafficking – without providing evidence – and publicly entertaining a US “operation” in the country. Monica Villamizar, a Colombian-American journalist, says the mood on the streets has been a mix of shock and fear. Now, following a phone call that temporarily cooled ...
Feb 02, 2026•13 min•Ep. 1807
Australia likes to present itself as a defender of human rights. But right now, on the world stage, that reputation is being seriously questioned. Dozens of countries have called on Australia to stop locking up children, some as young as ten, and to confront the fact that Indigenous kids make up the overwhelming majority of those behind bars. For a nation that claims moral leadership on human rights, the scrutiny now facing Australia is deeply shameful and impossible to ignore. The tough-on-crim...
Feb 01, 2026•16 min•Ep. 1806
In Anthony Albanese’s political universe, personal relationships are everything. High on the list for Albanese is his bond with Peter V'landys, the Chair of the Australian Rugby League Commission and Chief Executive of Racing NSW. That relationship has been central to the government’s decision to again delay reforms of gambling advertising, which V’Landys strongly opposes. Today, special correspondent for The Saturday Paper Jason Koutsoukis with the inside story of why the government still hasn’...
Jan 31, 2026•16 min•Ep. 1805
The Liberal Party is locked in a very public power struggle. The Coalition has broken apart. One Nation is on the rise. What’s emerging isn’t just a shift in support, it’s something deeper – a realignment of the conservative side of politics, with broader ramifications that we’re only beginning to understand. Today, political columnist and former Labor adviser Sean Kelly – on what’s breaking inside conservative politics, what it means for the government, and what comes next. If you enjoy 7am , t...
Jan 30, 2026•15 min•Ep. 1803
At Forrest Place in Boorloo (Perth), on what this country officially calls Australia Day, around 2,500 people gathered to mark Invasion Day. They listened to speakers, held banners and, for a few hours, took up civic space in the way protest is meant to: visibly, peacefully, together. Then, from a balcony above, an object arced through the air and landed near the stage. Police allege it was a homemade improvised explosive device containing nails, ball bearings and chemicals, later described as a...
Jan 30, 2026•9 min•Ep. 1802
Colin Boyce is a Nationals MP from Central Queensland. He represents a huge swathe of land stretching from Bundaberg to Rockhampton – and as he’s travelled around his electorate, he’s been confronted by the looming threat of One Nation. Colin is so dismayed about the split of the Coalition, he’s challenging David Littleproud for the leadership of the Nationals on Monday. He says it’s a last-ditch effort to “save the National Party from its own self-destruction”. Today, Colin Boyce, on why he’s c...
Jan 29, 2026•12 min•Ep. 1801
Xi Jinping has just sacked his top military general – putting him under investigation and accusing him of “grave violations of discipline and the law”. It’s the latest, and most stunning sacking in a massive purge of the country’s military and political elite. With China’s People's Liberation Army in crisis – there are now questions about what it will mean for China’s plans to take over Taiwan. Today, expert in US-Asia Relations at Harvard Kennedy School and author of several books on China, Ran...
Jan 28, 2026•15 min•Ep. 1800
Minneapolis has become the focal point of Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, as he tries to round up and deport 10 million people from the country. As the city’s residents have fought back against ICE’s often violent arrests, protests have intensified. In just three weeks, two American citizens have been killed in Minneapolis by ICE agents, with many more injured. So why is Trump targeting Minneapolis? And what comes next for this small city under siege? Today, journalist and radio host Jason...
Jan 27, 2026•17 min•Ep. 1799
In 2019, a new venture in the Australian outback looked set to export our solar power to the world – upending our neighbours’ reliance on fossil fuels. Backed by the billionaires Mike Cannon-Brookes and Andrew Forrest – Sun Cable was supposed to be Australia’s largest ever renewable energy project, transporting electricity to Singapore via 4,300 kilometres of sea cable. It was meant to show what a different future could look like – one where Australia could export massive amounts of renewable po...
Jan 26, 2026•16 min•Ep. 1798
Family violence in Aboriginal communities is a national crisis – Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women are 33 times more likely to be victims of domestic violence, and eight times more likely to be killed by their partner. The trauma First Nations women experience is often made worse by the systems they seek help from and people within those systems that often misidentify the victim as the perpetrator. But alongside these fraught systems are people doing relentless and unheralded work, to ...
Jan 25, 2026•17 min•Ep. 1797
In the 1970s, eight children in Perth were sent to a psychiatric hospital to be ‘treated’ for being transgender. Their experiences became the basis of a medical study that claimed kids could be cured of their identity. Now, nearly forty years after it was released, that same study is being cited in arguments against trans healthcare and being used to shape policy and law. Today, Walkley Award-winning journalist and founding editor of ABC Queer, Mon Schafter, on how a forgotten experiment from an...
Jan 24, 2026•16 min•Ep. 1796
It’s the on-again, off-again political drama that has turned Australian politics into something resembling a soap opera. For the second time in a year, the Liberal and National parties have split, rendering the coalition dead – again. The break-up has once again thrown Sussan Ley’s leadership under the bus, shattered the opposition’s ability to challenge the government – and underscored deeper pressures from an ascendant One Nation. Today, contributing editor of The New Daily Amy Remeikis, on th...
Jan 23, 2026•17 min•Ep. 1795
Donald Trump has invited Australia to join his new “Board of Peace” – a Trump-led body he says will help bring peace to Gaza. But the invitation comes with a warning. Some leaders say the board could undermine the United Nations – and Trump himself has suggested it might even replace it. Trump has spent years attacking the United Nations as ineffective – and this term, his administration has moved to pull the US out of dozens of UN agencies. So is this a peace plan, or a power play? Today, UN an...
Jan 22, 2026•16 min•Ep. 1794
This week, Labor’s watered-down hate speech laws passed the Senate. The following day, the bigger story wasn’t the bill. Three senior Nationals – Bridget McKenzie, Susan McDonald and Ross Cadell – were forced off the opposition frontbench after defying shadow cabinet and voting against the legislation. Then, after a late night emergency meeting, the rest of the Nationals frontbench followed suit, quitting their roles in a show of solidarity. Now, the Liberal National partnership is hanging in th...
Jan 21, 2026•15 min•Ep. 1793
When Elon Musk first launched his AI tool Grok, he called it “rebellious” and anti-woke. But over the summer, what that meant took a disturbing turn. The chatbot, which is embedded in Musk's social media platform X, started creating sexualised images of women and children without their consent. Anthony Albanese has staked his legacy on keeping children safe online, so what is he doing to protect them from Grok? Today, associate editor at Crikey, Cam Wilson, on whether it’s time for the governmen...
Jan 20, 2026•13 min•Ep. 1792
In the aftermath of the 1996 massacre at Port Arthur, Prime Minister John Howard donned a bullet proof vest and argued the case for gun control, to crowds of angry protestors. His reforms, including a ban on automatic and semi-automatic weapons, and a national buyback scheme, changed the country by getting rid of more than half a million guns. But in the years since, the number of guns in Australia has skyrocketed, and as Anthony Albanese tries to change that, the Coalition is fighting back, whi...
Jan 19, 2026•17 min•Ep. 1791
Rex Patrick is a former senator from South Australia. Before that, he was a submariner in the Navy. Last year, he noticed a reference to a new arm of the Australian Federal Police called the AUKUS Command. He wanted to know more, so he lodged Freedom of Information requests with the Australian Submarine Agency and the Australian Federal Police. The documents he got back were heavily redacted – but he was able to form a picture of a secretive new command set up to protect AUKUS submarines. But hi...
Jan 18, 2026•12 min•Ep. 1790
The fallout from this year’s Adelaide Writers’ Week debacle has reignited fierce debate about political interference in the arts and about who gets to speak in Australia’s cultural spaces. After the invitation to Palestinian-Australian author Randa Abdel-Fattah was withdrawn, 180 writers pulled out in protest. The festival was eventually cancelled and Adelaide Festival has since apologised for excluding the author from Writers’ Week, admitting it had failed to uphold artistic freedom. The whole ...
Jan 17, 2026•14 min•Ep. 1789
On Monday, parliament will return early to debate new laws to deal with hate speech and gun ownership. The legislation has been drafted in a hurry – under mounting pressure in the aftermath of the Bondi terror attack. But support for the bill has already fractured. The Coalition says it goes too far. The Greens say it doesn’t go far enough. Both want more time to consider the changes. The debate over what is and isn’t hate is unfolding at a time of deep political division with consequences not j...
Jan 16, 2026•16 min•Ep. 1788
Directly after Donald Trump intervened in Venezuela, capturing president Nicolas Maduro and laying claim to the country’s oil industry, the US President set his sights on Greenland. Trump claims America “needs” Greenland for national security, and has asked his military chiefs to draw up plans to invade if neccessary. Meanwhile, a meeting between US Vice-President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Danish Foreign Minister Lars Rasmussen and Greenlandic Foreign Minister Vivian Motzfeldt en...
Jan 15, 2026•17 min•Ep. 1787
Is the world about to see the United States intervene in another country – this time, Iran? Since late December, Iran has been rocked by mass protests, and the government has responded with force. The internet has been cut for days at a time, making it difficult to verify what’s happening on the ground. Reports suggest a death toll in the thousands, with even larger numbers of protesters detained. Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump has been publicly encouraging protesters and declaring that “h...
Jan 14, 2026•16 min•Ep. 1786
Adelaide Writers’ Week has been cancelled after the removal of Palestinian author Randa Abdel-Fattah sparked a mass boycott of the event by more than 100 writers who were programmed to attend, as well as the resignation of the festival’s director. In a statement on Tuesday, Adelaide Festival apologised to Abdel-Fattah, but rather than reinstating her, they announced that Australia’s premier free literary event would not go ahead – and almost all remaining board members would stand down. The boar...
Jan 13, 2026•15 min•Ep. 1785
Ten days out from the American capture of Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro, the country faces an uncertain future. Pro-regime gangs with guns are roaming the streets, citizens are deleting their messages and search histories before going out, for fear of being searched and punished for being critical of the government. Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump insists he will control the oil-rich nation. Today, we speak to a Venezuelan journalist who lives abroad. We aren’t using her full name as her...
Jan 12, 2026•16 min•Ep. 1784
Ruby Jones is taking some time off from 7am to report an episode of the ABC’s premier investigative news program, Four Corners. While she’s gone, Daniel James will be sharing hosting duties with journalist and foreign correspondent Nicole Johnston. Originally a country girl from regional NSW, Nicole has spent almost two decades reporting on the biggest events shaping our world. From the Middle East to Africa, Europe, the US and Asia, there aren’t many frontlines she hasn’t been on. In this bonus...
Jan 12, 2026•11 min•Ep. 1783
Last week, Anthony Albanese announced a royal commission – something he’d spent nearly a month arguing against. Now, former High Court justice Virginia Bell will lead an inquiry into the Bondi terror attack and the rise of antisemitism in Australia. It’s a major shift for the Prime Minister – one that raises questions about how he makes decisions and how he handles pressure. Today, press gallery journalist Karen Middleton, on the scope of the royal commission, the political fallout of Albanese’s...
Jan 11, 2026•17 min•Ep. 1782
“I’m REAL and I’m sitting here blushing because of YOU!” That’s the message 76-year-old Thongbue “Bue” Wongbandue received from a flirty Facebook Messenger chatbot before it proposed he travel to New York for a meet-up. Bue – who was cognitively impaired after suffering a stroke – packed a suitcase to catch a train, believing the woman was real. He never made it home alive. Jeff Horwitz is an investigative tech reporter based in Silicon Valley. He has written a book about Facebook’s scandals and...
Jan 09, 2026•16 min•Ep. 1781
Darwin’s crocodile farms supply some of the world’s most exclusive fashion houses. But as award-winning journalist Katherine Wilson started looking into this booming hundred million dollar industry, she knew she had to visit the Northern Territory herself. As she got closer to this secretive industry, what she found was shocking: animals being kept in cramped conditions and being killed in drawn out processes, Indigenous people who say they are being ripped off for dangerous work and claims of c...
Jan 08, 2026•14 min•Ep. 1780
