Donald trump

Thursday

The Spectator

Portrait of the week: Trump’s inauguration, Israel-Hamas ceasefire and cardboard humans comfort lonely fish

Home Axel Rudakubana, 18, pleaded guilty to the murder of three girls in a knife attack at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class at Southport on 29 July 2024, and to ten attempted murders as well as possessing al Qaeda literature and producing the poison ricin. He had been charged with murder on 31 July but police insisted then that the incident was not being treated as terror-related; the culprit was charged with two terrorism offences on 29 October. From 30 July, rioting had swept the country for a week. Now it was disclosed that the murderer had been referred three times to Prevent, the anti-terrorism programme, when he was 13

George Osborne

Give David Beckham a knighthood

Donald Trump descends on Davos as if he were in Apocalypse Now. Four years ago I saw his cavalcade of helicopter gunships fly over the town. With the noise echoing off the mountain valley sides, he drowned out all the other conversations. This week his inauguration speech in the Congress Rotunda – watched in huddles around screens at Davos – had a similar effect. Withdrawing from the Paris climate talks and the World Health Organisation, the President was napalming the global international order which is celebrated here. And yet, apart from Bill Clinton in his final year in office, no American president has come to the World Economic Forum –

Thursday

Paul Wood

The Donald’s plans for the Middle East

The former US president Jimmy Carterdied, at the age of 100, just before news of an imminent deal to free the last of Israel’s hostages in Gaza. Carter’s presidency was crippled by his own hostage crisis, American diplomats held captive in Tehran. Freeing them became his administration’s highest priority, and he worked on it for every single one of the 444 days the crisis lasted, often to the exclusion of anything else. By contrast, the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, resisted massive domestic pressure to do a deal for his hostages in order to pursue the war aim of destroying Hamas. You could call this statesmanship, or something else, but

The Spectator

The folly of Keir Starmer’s Chagos Islands deal

It would be natural to assume that sinking bond markets would be the government’s priority this week, as low UK growth and high borrowing rattles investors. Yet remarkably the Prime Minister’s attentions seem to be focused elsewhere: on advancing a deal to cede sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius in the days before Donald Trump is inaugurated for his second term as US President. Trump is an opponent of the deal for good reason. The US military base on Diego Garcia proved invaluable during the two Gulf Wars. Keir Starmer is yet to meet an international tribunal he won’t genuflect before Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer, appears

The Spectator

Portrait of the week: Tulip Siddiq quits, Sturgeon splits from husband and Trump spared jail

Home Tulip Siddiq resigned as economic secretary to the Treasury, although she was found not to have broken the ministerial code; she had, however, lived in a flat provided by allies of her aunt, Sheikh Hasina, the deposed prime minister of Bangladesh, apparently under the impression that the flat was a gift from her parents, despite having signed a Land Registry transfer form for it. Rachel Reeves, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, flew to China and met He Lifeng, one of the four vice-premiers. In her absence the cost of government borrowing rose again, with the yield on 30-year gilts rising to 5.42 per cent, the highest for 27 years. Downing Street

Freddy Gray Freddy Gray

Empire of Trump: the President’s plan to make America greater

‘The mission of the United States is one of benevolent assimilation,’ said William McKinley, America’s 25th commander-in-chief, who happens to be one of Donald Trump’s favourite presidents. Trump, who barely dodged a bullet in 2024, shares a number of traits with McKinley, who was assassinated in 1901: Scottish blood, ferocious work ethic, an affinity with the super-rich that somehow appeals to the working classes, a faith in tariffs as a means of safeguarding industry, and a willingness to expand America’s empire to boost future prosperity. ‘I keep speaking to Europeans and British embassy people and telling them he really means this stuff’ ‘I’m talking about protecting the freeworld,’ said Trump

James Orr

J. D. Vance is the future of MAGA

The vice-presidency of the United States has always been the butt of jokes. ‘I don’t plan to be buried until I’ve died,’ quipped Daniel Webster when he declined William Henry Harrison’s offer of the role. John Nance Garner, who served as FDR’s vice-president, dismissed it as ‘not worth a bucket of warm piss’. Even John Adams, the first to hold the office, was equivocal: ‘I am Vice-President. In this I am nothing, but I may be everything.’ He may prove to be a more effective standard bearer for Trumpism than Trump himself That ‘everything’ has proven elusive. Fewer than a third of vice-presidents have gone on to occupy the Oval

Thursday

Katy Balls

‘There’s been a vibe shift’: welcome to the new political disorder

Donald Trump isn’t back in the White House yet, but already his victory is being felt across the world. Greenland is pondering the prospect of an invasion after the President-elect refused to rule it out during a Mar-a-Lago press conference. In Canada, the last western leader from the days before Trump has just exited the stage. Justin Trudeau, the one-time liberal hero, quit earlier this week in the face of tanking ratings. Nick Clegg, the former Liberal Democrat leader, is out at Meta and the billionaires of Silicon Valley are bracing themselves for what comes next. Mark Zuckerberg has announced sweeping changes (including an end to fact-checkers) in response to

Saturday

Ian O’Doherty

Ireland is not ready for Trump

It will be an uncertain year for Ireland. The Irish economy has for a long time been artificially propped up by the billons it accrues in tax revenues from American tech companies based in the country. Many dread Donald Trump’s return, fearing he will force these firms to move back to the US. Those fears have been compounded by the Irish government’s bizarre quest to stigmatise and sanction Israel – perhaps the only country in the world to be more popular in American minds than Ireland. In February, then-taoiseach Leo Varadkar and Spanish President Pedro Sanchez wrote to EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and asked her to conduct

Tuesday

Freddy Gray

Are migrants ‘self-deporting’ in fear of Trump?

26 min listen

Springfield Ohio became a talking point in this year’s Presidential election after Donald Trump referred to Haitian migrants ‘eating the cats and dogs’. Steven Edginton, GB News US Correspondent has been to Springfield Ohio to speak to some of the migrants there, investigate some reports that migrants are fleeing America in fear of a Trump presidency, and find our from locals about how Springfield has changed since the arrival of around 15,000 Haitian migrants. 

Thursday

William Moore

Christmas Special 2024 with Rod Liddle, Lionel Shriver, Matthew Parris and Mary Wakefield

71 min listen

Welcome to a special festive episode of The Edition podcast, where we will be taking you through the pages of The Spectator’s Christmas triple issue. Up first: our review of the year – and what a year it has been. At the start of 2024, the outcome of the US election looked very different, the UK had a different Prime Minister, and The Spectator had a different editor! Luckily, The Spectator’s regular columnists are on hand to declare what they got right – and wrong – throughout the year, and whether they’re optimistic for 2025. Rod Liddle, Matthew Parris, Mary Wakefield and Lionel Shriver take us through everything from Trump to trans (03:24). Next: ‘Good riddance

Andrew Roberts

When will Ronald Reagan get the recognition he deserves?

The talented military historian Max Boot has published a well-researched life of Ronald Reagan that is fundamentally wrong. First the good parts: he has combed through lots of archives finding new information and has interviewed countless people who worked with or knew Reagan. His style also bears the reader effortlessly along. Yet his claim that Reagan was merely a lightweight pragmatist who had little effect on reviving the American economy, resuscitating the country’s self-esteem or winning the Cold War is absurdly revisionist. It says more about the author’s own rejection of the Republican party than it does about Reagan’s world-historical achievements. Quite unnecessarily in a biography of someone who left

Mary Beard

Elon Musk is wrong about the Roman Empire

I was in Washington D.C. during The Election, living halfway between the Capitol and White House. Concerned friends suggested I move to some boutique hotel in Virginia for election week, in case of ‘trouble’ in Washington. Or at least, they said, I should stock up the freezer, as I might not be able to get safely to the shops for several days if the results were bitterly contested. I took the freezer option (plus an enhanced cellar) and planned a week of working from home, to follow the news from each swing state, fortified by my supplies. It was all for nothing. By the time I woke up on the

Craig Brown

Don’t tell me to ‘unwind’!

The most irritating word of the year was ‘unwind’. ‘Unwind with one of our artisan cocktails in the curated ambience of…’ and so on. For most of us, the call to ‘unwind’ promotes the very stress it purports to alleviate. Radio 3 is currently the station most fretful about unwinding, beseeching us to ‘ease into your day with welcoming harmonies’ and ‘focus for the morning with stress-busting music’. Its new ‘24/7 stream’ is called ‘Classical Unwind’. Is this a wind-up? If you’re still feeling anxious by the evening, Classic FM offers ‘Calm Classics’ at 10 p.m.: ‘The perfect soothing soundtrack to help you wind down at the end of the day.’

Kate Andrews Kate Andrews

‘The public sector is the illness’: Javier Milei on his first year in office

Buenos Aires ‘I never wind down,’ says Argentina’s President Javier Milei when we meet in his Presidential Office at the Casa Rosada. ‘I work all day, practically… I get up at 6 a.m., I take a shower and at 7 a.m. I am already at my desk working. And I work all the way until 11 p.m. I enjoy my job. I enjoy cutting public spending. I love the chainsaw.’ It was a photo of Milei with a chainsaw – who was then the insurgent candidate – that propelled him to international fame last year. He waved it on the campaign trail as a symbol of what he would do

Monday

Freddy Gray

Is Assad’s downfall a ‘catastrophic success’?

43 min listen

Over the weekend, the rebels from the Syrian opposition claimed Damascus and president Assad had fled to Russia. Keir Starmer has welcomed the collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s barbaric regime in Syria and called for civilians to be protected after rebel forces took control of Damascus. Freddy Gray speaks to Michael Weiss, an editor at The Insider, and Owen Matthews, writer and historian. They discuss how this story could develop on the international stage, whether this is the reinvention of the Arab Spring, and what is left of Iran, now that several of its proxies have been destroyed.

Friday

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?

Thursday

Katy Balls

Boris Johnson on Covid failures, the Nanny State & his advice for ‘Snoozefest’ Starmer

36 min listen

Former prime minister Boris Johnson joins The Spectator’s political editor Katy Balls to divulge the contents of his new book, Unleashed. He reflects on his premiership as PM during the pandemic, describing the time as a ‘nightmare’ for him. He also details how he managed to suppress the force of Nigel Farage, and gives advice to Keir Starmer on how to build a relationship with Donald Trump. Watch the full interview on SpectatorTV: https://youtu.be/wg-Oxh0X-zM

Adrian Pascu-Tulbure

The rise of Romania’s right-wing disruptor

Strange things are happening again in global politics. In Romania, a former UN sustainability adviser who has made admiring remarks about the fascist 1930s Iron Guard movement has just won the first round of the presidential elections. If you like Andrew Tate, the notorious ‘manosphere’ influencer who also happens to be a Romanian resident, you’ll love Calin Georgescu. A trim 62-year-old former national judo champion, he likes to post videos of himself swimming in ice on TikTok. ‘I believe in my immune system because I have faith in my creator,’ he says. He’s a Putin admirer who ran on an explicitly anti-Nato, anti-EU and anti-Ukrainian platform. And he caused particular

Kate Andrews Kate Andrews

What Scott Bessent’s appointment means for Trump 2.0

How rare it is to be given a second chance. That’s what the American people have handed Donald Trump. His second shot at the presidency means avoiding past mistakes, which in TrumpWorld means finally harnessing the full power of the state. Even in the last year of his first term, Trump was struggling to fill all the political appointment vacancies he had at his disposal. This was the consequence of never developing a real plan for governing that went beyond chanting ‘Drain the swamp’. Elon Musk talked down Bessent as the ‘business-as-usual choice’, but that’s what markets are looking for This time round, things are going to be different. Trump