America

Kate Andrews

UK interest rates held, plus could Musk fund Reform?

10 min listen

The Bank of England has voted to hold interest rates at 4.75%. The Spectator’s economics editor Kate Andrews joins Katy Balls and Freddy Gray to discuss the decision and what this means for the economy.  Also on the podcast they discuss how a potential donation from Elon Musk to Reform UK has rattled politicians across the political spectrum. Could Labour seek to reform political donation rules to limit donations from foreign owned companies? And is this a sensible move, or could those in favour of changing the rules face a charge of hypocrisy? Produced by Patrick Gibbons and Oscar Edmondson.

Biden’s Cuba policy has been a disaster for the Democrats

Ten years ago this week, Barack Obama announced the historic US rapprochement with Cuba. Alongside Obama during years of secret negotiations was Joe Biden – then Vice President, and a trusted advisor on foreign affairs. But while Obama’s policies reduced Cubans’ reliance on the communist state, President Biden’s actions have done the opposite: spurring extreme hardship and a huge wave of migration to the US. Time and time again Cuba has had an outsized influence on US elections After four years of Donald Trump’s hardline stance, Biden entered the White House in 2021 with a pledge to ‘reverse the failed Trump policies that inflicted harm on Cubans and their families’. But

Gareth Roberts

What’s the truth about the New Jersey drone sightings?

What is going on with the drones buzzing over New Jersey in the United States? Reportedly ‘the size of cars’, sometimes flying low in formation, these mysterious semi-identified flying objects have been sighted in their thousands every night – and only at night – for weeks. They might not even be drones. Are they alien spaceships? Are they from Russia or China? Are they just planes? Are they even anything at all? I’ve watched a number of videos purporting to show these invaders. ‘What is that thing? It’s freaking huge!’ one awestruck observer can be heard over footage of what looks like a commercial passenger jet.  It’s increasingly hard to

Brendan O’Neill

Stop idolising Luigi Mangione

So according to the modern left, killing the fascists of Hamas is ‘genocide’, but killing a CEO and father of two is ‘justice’? How else are we to make sense of the creepy idolisation of Luigi Mangione, the suspect in the shooting dead of Brian Thompson, chief executive of the American health-insurance firm UnitedHealthcare? Seriously, the swooning over Mangione is a new low for the ‘very online’ left. This was just desserts for America’s unfair system of health insurance, they insisted Thompson was slain on the streets of Manhattan last Wednesday. He was 50 years old, a dad and he’d been boss of UnitedHealthcare for three years. Almost instantly, even

Gavin Mortimer

Donald Trump was right about Paris

Donald Trump is in Paris today to attend the official reopening of the renovated Notre Dame cathedral. The president-elect has what could be described as a love-hate relationship with the French capital. He loves the place but it – more precisely its mayor and most of its right-on residents – hates him. This contempt first manifested itself days after he defeated Hillary Trump in the 2016 presidential election. Hundreds of protestors took to the streets of Paris, banging pots and pans and chanting ‘No Trump, no hate, no KKK’ and ‘Hey hey, ho ho, Donald Trump has got to go’. The organisers of the rally listed why they believed Trump

Starmer will struggle to keep both the EU and US happy

We do not have to make a choice between our alliance with the United States and closer relations with the European Union: that was the message of the Prime Minister’s traditional annual speech to the Lord Mayor’s Banquet at the Guildhall. Sir Keir Starmer called the supposed binary ‘plain wrong’, and prayed in aid some of his most illustrious predecessors. I reject it utterly. Attlee did not choose between allies. Churchill did not choose. The national interest demands that we work with both. He described the ‘special relationship’ with the United States in profound terms, written ‘in the ink of shared sacrifice… in Normandy, Flanders and around the world’, and

Why Joe Biden was right to pardon Hunter

President Joe Biden’s unexpected pardon of his son, Hunter, on federal gun charges may appear as the ultimate example of lawfare hypocrisy, but it’s really the best outcome for everyone – including Donald Trump. Despite indications that such a pardon was unlikely, Biden – who infamously declared on X in May that “no one is above the law” – now believes that Hunter was “unfairly prosecuted.” Jail time would have kept the Biden family in the spotlight long past their expiration date “I believe in the justice system,” Biden said on Sunday while announcing an end to his son’s legal drama, “but as I have wrestled with this, I also believe raw politics has infected this

Freddy Gray

Is ‘testosterone politics’ surging?

56 min listen

Freddy Gray is joined by Charles Cornish-Dale, an academic and bodybuilder known for writing under the pseudonym Raw Egg Nationalist. On the podcast they discuss the recent surge in testosterone politics on the right, what’s behind the fall in male testosterone levels, and why this could lead to the end of humanity… 

Freddy Gray

What’s going on in Mar-a-Lago?

45 min listen

Freddy Gray is joined by Tara Palmeri, senior political correspondent for Puck. They discuss how the presidential transition is going. Is the breakneck speed with which he appointed his cabinet even more chaotic than last time? Is the process rife with backstabbing? And are your really ever ‘in’ or ‘out’ when it comes to Trump?

Kate Andrews

Kate Andrews, Mark Galeotti, Adrian Pascu-Tulbure, Michael Hann and Olivia Potts

31 min listen

On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: Kate Andrews examines the appointment of Scott Bessent as US Treasury Secretary (1:20); Mark Galeotti highlights Putin’s shadow campaign across Europe (7:10); Adrian Pascu-Tulbure reports on the surprising rise of Romania’s Calin Georgescu (15:45); Michael Hann reviews Irish bands Kneecap and Fontaines D.C. (22:54); and Olivia Potts provides her notes on London’s Smithfield Market, following the news it may close (27:28).  Produced and presented by Patrick Gibbons.

Freddy Gray

From Gabbard to Gaetz: Ambassador John Bolton on Trump’s ‘crackpot’ Cabinet

20 min listen

John Bolton has served under both Republican administrations of the 21st Century: first as US Ambassador to the United Nations under George W. Bush, and then under Donald Trump where he was – surprisingly – his longest serving National Security Advisor. In this episode of Americano, Freddy Gray discusses the incoming second Trump administration with Amb. Bolton. From Tulsi Gabbard to Elon Musk, what does he make of Trump’s appointments? How could U.S. foreign policy change? And what are the implications for Ukraine?  Produced by Patrick Gibbons.

Matthew Parris

Matthew Parris, Joanna Bell, Peter Frankopan, Mary Wakefield and Flora Watkins

38 min listen

On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: pondering AI, Matthew Parris wonders if he is alone in thinking (1:10); Joanna Bell meets the leader of the Independent Ireland party, Michael Collins, ahead of the Irish general election later this month (8:41); Professor Peter Frankopan argues that the world is facing a new race to rule the seas (17:31); Mary Wakefield reviews Rod Dreher’s new book Living in wonder: finding mystery and meaning in a secular age (28:47); and, Flora Watkins looks at the Christmas comeback of Babycham (34:10).  Produced and presented by Patrick Gibbons.

Starmer needs the royal family to help him woo Trump

Donald Trump’s historic re-election must be a particularly bitter pill for Keir Starmer to swallow. Leaders from Javier Milei to Giorgia Meloni are scrambling to curry favour, and Trump’s pal Reform MP Nigel Farage is a regular on the post-election Mar-a-Lago scene. But that’s not the style of Sir Keir and his merry band of net zero Never Trumpers: they could end up singing a different tune that would literally leave Britain out in the cold in the new ‘Drill Baby Drill’ Trump era. Yet an unexpected ally could prevent the bi-lateral relationship between Britain and the United States from unraveling further: the British Royal Family. The monarchy has long been

Why Matt Gaetz backed out of the race to become Trump’s attorney general

In Washington, you don’t name anyone disruptive or potentially transformative to your administration without dealing with flack from the Senate. They like things straightforward, predictable, vetted, established and preplanned — and Donald Trump’s cabinet of outsiders is anything but. The Brett Kavanaugh nomination was widely considered to be dead even among his most emphatic supporters (reportedly even the president himself) before his stunning performance before the Senate Judiciary Committee righted the ship. Now, several members of the incoming Trump 47 team faces a certain onslaught from Democrats and potentially wavering support from some Republicans. So getting the cabinet the president wants will require the expenditure of political capital, as it always does with

Freddy Gray

The ‘experts’ who enabled RFK Jr’s rise

22 min listen

The nomination of Robert F. Kennedy Jr to be secretary of health and human services in the second Trump administration has horrified ‘experts’. A left-wing Democrat who admires the late Venezuelan Marxist dictator Hugo Chavez, hates big business, rails against the ultra-processed food that Donald Trump likes to eat and wants climate sceptics jailed.  But in the magazine this week Matt Ridley explains how the experts who now bash him have contributed in putting him where is, and that official Covid misinformation has contributed to his rise. So what could he do in office? Will he release these Covid files? Matt joins Freddy to discuss. 

Gavin Mortimer

Donald Trump’s style of politics originated in Europe

A headline in a recent Washington Post op-ed declared that: ‘The Trump contagion is already in Europe – and it’s spreading’. The Post‘s European Affairs columnist, Lee Hockstader, who wrote the article, described the president-elect as ‘a dangerous role model to a rising cadre of European wannabes’. Sorry, Post. Europe may have given the USA blue jeans, burgers, and bubble wrap, but Trump’s form of political leadership originated in Europe at the turn of this century. Its initial purveyors were Pim Fortuyn of Holland, France’s Jean-Marie Le Pen, and Jörg Haider of Austria. They also knew, like Trump, how to engage with the masses, tapping into anger at the liberal

Freddy Gray

Is Trump making America Florida?

31 min listen

Freddy Gray is joined by political operator and consultant Roger Stone, a Floridian, to discuss Trump’s cabinet appointees. Susie Wiles, Marco Rubio, Matt Gaetz are all part of Trump’s new team – what’s behind Florida’s growing influence within the Republican Party?

Freddy Gray

Trump’s RFK Jr appointment is going to cause trouble

Of all Donald Trump’s cabinet appointments this week, his selection of Robert F. Kennedy Jr to lead the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is in some ways the least surprising. Yet it could prove the most controversial. RFK Jr’s mistrust of Big Pharma and Big Food resonates widely If confirmed, RFK Jr will oversee a sprawling federal agency of some 80,000 employees. HHS shapes which drugs Americans can access, the food they consume, and directs billions of dollars into medical research. Given Kennedy’s radical views on the downsides of processed foods, certain vaccines and widely prescribed medicines, his leadership could place a Republican administration in direct conflict with

Freddy Gray

Will Elon Musk Make America Great Again?

28 min listen

As Donald Trump selects his new cabinet, Elon Musk has been chosen to head up the new efficiency department. Douglas Murray, Spectator columnist, joins Americano host Freddy Gray to discuss. How will their relationship shape Trump’s presidency? What will Musk’s ownership of X, formerly Twitter, mean for free speech? And will their newfound friendship last the stretch of Donald Trump’s second term?

Welcome to life on Planet Elon

On 13 July this year, an assassin’s bullet grazed the ear of Donald Trump as he turned his head on stage in Butler, Pennsylvania. The whole world saw it and his response: ‘Fight, fight, fight.’ For Elon Musk, this was not just a news event but a galvanising and clarifying moment. He immediately posted a video of the shooting to X and wrote: ‘I fully endorse President Trump and hope for his rapid recovery.’ Musk is different from most people. For him, going all-in really means going all-in. When Trump returned to Butler last month, he was joined on stage by the billionaire. Musk is now one of the most