# Could Australia’s media survive Trump-style attacks?

An episode of [7am](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1461999702), 24 Sep 2026, 17 min.

Audio: https://p.podderapp.com/2544644999/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/2fb3740d-3436-44af-8cc0-a91900716aa5/62723a1f-3e96-4fc4-882c-b25e0181da4d/b3a82923-8589-47b8-a14d-b4ce00702270/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=70f29d90-2a63-48aa-bf8f-b25e0181da70

For years, Donald Trump’s attacks on the media were treated as part of the spectacle of his politics. Now, three major news organisations have had their White House passes revoked – and Trump says others could follow. Here in Australia, we’re seeing Pauline Hanson follow the same playbook – with One Nation repeatedly deciding which news organisations can attend its press conferences. But unlike America, press freedom in Australia has remarkably few legal protections backing it. So what happens when politicians stop respecting the rules we’ve simply assumed they would follow? Today, journalist and press freedom advocate Peter Greste, on how fragile press freedom is in Australia and why we’ve relied for so long on convention rather than law. If you enjoy 7am, the best way you can support us is by making a contribution at 7ampodcast.com.au/support. Socials: Stay in touch with us on Instagram Guest: Journalist and press freedom advocate, Peter Greste Photo: AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:01] Speaker 1: I don't think somebody should be allowed to come in
[0:02] Speaker 1: and write fake stories. They're fake news.
[0:06] Speaker 2: For years, Donald Trump's attacks on the media were treated
[0:09] Speaker 2: as part of the spectacle of his politics. Now, three
[0:13] Speaker 2: major news organisations have had their White House passes revoked,
[0:17] Speaker 2: and Trump says others could follow.
[0:18] Speaker 1: A very simple ban. I don't want him in my office.
[0:22] Speaker 1: I don't want him here. I would say the ban
[0:24] Speaker 1: would go as far as you can.
[0:26] Speaker 2: Here in Australia, we're seeing Pauline Hanson follow the same playbook.
[0:30] Speaker 2: with One Nation repeatedly deciding which news organisations can attend
[0:34] Speaker 2: its press conferences. But unlike America, Australia's press freedoms have
[0:39] Speaker 2: remarkably few legal protections backing them. So what happens when
[0:43] Speaker 2: politicians stop respecting the rules we've simply assumed they would follow?
[0:47] Speaker 2: I'm Ruby Jones, and you're listening to 7am. Today, journalist
[0:55] Speaker 2: and press freedom advocate, Peter Craster, on how fragile press
[0:58] Speaker 2: freedom is in Australia, and why we've relied so long
[1:02] Speaker 2: on convention rather than law. It's Friday, September 25.
[1:15] Speaker 3: Peter, welcome to the show.
[1:16] Speaker 1: Thanks very much for having me.
[1:18] Speaker 2: Over the weekend in the US, Trump banned some journalists,
[1:22] Speaker 2: including those from CNN and Politico, from the White House.
[1:26] Speaker 2: And this was just another step in what is a
[1:28] Speaker 2: long and fractious relationship between Trump and the press in
[1:31] Speaker 2: the US. Can you tell me, to begin with, a
[1:34] Speaker 2: bit about what he said at the time and what
[1:36] Speaker 2: happened next?
[1:37] Speaker 1: So I think it's worth backing up a little bit.
[1:39] Speaker 1: You said it's just the latest, and it is just
[1:42] Speaker 1: the latest in a long and fairly fractious relationship, but
[1:44] Speaker 1: it is hard to overstate the significance of this one.
[1:48] Speaker 1: Trump in the past has kicked out CNN's White House
[1:52] Speaker 1: correspondent in his first administration, Jim Acosta. That was overturned
[2:02] Speaker 1: by the courts as a violation of the First Amendment rights.
[2:06] Speaker 1: He's also banned Associated Press from parts of the White
[2:10] Speaker 1: House from the Oval Office, but hasn't revoked their passes.
[2:13] Speaker 1: So in some respects, this feels like a continuation of
[2:18] Speaker 1: of a fairly long-running battle. But he's never actually banned
[2:22] Speaker 1: three entire organizations from the White House and revoked their passes.
[2:26] Speaker 1: And that is a very, very significant step. What happened
[2:29] Speaker 1: was that at a news conference, he complained about those
[2:32] Speaker 1: news organizations and said that he'd be taking some action. Mr. President,
[2:36] Speaker 1: on the ban, what does that mean in practice?
[2:38] Speaker 3: Are you taking away their badges?
[2:40] Speaker 2: Are you banning them from the pool?
[2:41] Speaker 3: What does this actually mean?
[2:43] Speaker 1: When you say the ban, you don't have any bans
[2:45] Speaker 1: I'm involved in.
[2:46] Speaker 4: I got more bans.
[2:48] Speaker 1: A lot of journalists wondered what that would look like
[2:50] Speaker 1: until the next day. Over the weekend on Saturday, they
[2:53] Speaker 1: tried to enter the White House using their passes, and
[2:55] Speaker 1: they had those passes confiscated.
[2:57] Speaker 4: I went to scan my badge and enter my PIN number,
[3:00] Speaker 4: and the lights around the reader blinked red. I tried
[3:04] Speaker 4: it again, and then the officer asked me to hand
[3:07] Speaker 4: over my badge, and he said that it's been disabled.
[3:10] Speaker 4: And I asked, can you tell me why?
[3:14] Speaker 1: Big TV news networks that were all part of what's
[3:17] Speaker 1: known as the White House press pool all had a
[3:20] Speaker 1: chat to work out how they were going to respond,
[3:23] Speaker 1: and they decided to withdraw their support that they were
[3:27] Speaker 1: going to withdraw from the press pool itself. And that
[3:29] Speaker 1: is a very big deal. This is the big news
[3:31] Speaker 1: organizations that provide the TV coverage, not just to each other,
[3:36] Speaker 1: but to the entire world, saying, we're not going to
[3:38] Speaker 1: play ball. Now, of course, there are all sorts of
[3:40] Speaker 1: other ways that the video can get out. There's no
[3:43] Speaker 1: shortage of people with mobile phones and the White House
[3:46] Speaker 1: has its own streaming capacity. But not being on the networks,
[3:50] Speaker 1: I think, is a very big deal and it escalates
[3:52] Speaker 1: this pretty significantly.
[3:53] Speaker 2: Yeah, that show of solidarity that we saw from the
[3:57] Speaker 2: big US broadcasters, that's unusual. And, I mean, tell me
[4:01] Speaker 2: a bit more about the impact of that in terms
[4:03] Speaker 2: of making life different for Trump and the White House
[4:06] Speaker 2: and the way that he's covered.
[4:09] Speaker 1: Well, if there's one thing we know about President Donald Trump,
[4:12] Speaker 1: it is that he absolutely loves the media. He loves
[4:15] Speaker 1: the cameras. He's always referencing them. He's been the most
[4:19] Speaker 1: visible president in US history. And the networks are a
[4:23] Speaker 1: really important part of that. And withdrawing that coverage... even
[4:29] Speaker 1: for a relatively brief period, I think sends a very
[4:32] Speaker 1: strong message to the president. And we also saw the
[4:35] Speaker 1: impact of that in practical ways too. Just after the
[4:37] Speaker 1: White House pool shut down, the president had the ribbon-cutting
[4:43] Speaker 1: ceremony for a brand new helipad that he's taken a
[4:46] Speaker 1: great deal of pride in. And he had Marine One,
[4:49] Speaker 1: the official presidential helicopter, whirring away in the background. And
[4:52] Speaker 1: although the White House ran a video feed, you couldn't
[4:55] Speaker 1: hear what he was saying because they just didn't have
[4:57] Speaker 1: the professionals who are capable of rigging microphones that would
[5:00] Speaker 1: allow you to capture the president's voice. And so it
[5:09] Speaker 1: was a pretty embarrassing event for the president, but it
[5:12] Speaker 1: was also quite a powerful demonstration of just how important
[5:15] Speaker 1: it is to have good technicians, good professionals covering the president.
[5:19] Speaker 2: And so to turn to what's happening here in Australia,
[5:21] Speaker 2: why do you think we haven't seen... that same kind
[5:24] Speaker 2: of solidarity when it comes to the obvious comparison. So
[5:27] Speaker 2: that's Pauline Hanson banning the ABC and reporters from The
[5:30] Speaker 2: Guardian as well from her press events.
[5:32] Speaker 1: Look, I don't think what we're seeing coming from One
[5:36] Speaker 1: Nation is quite as dramatic or as serious as the
[5:40] Speaker 1: president kicking news organisations out of the White House. After all,
[5:44] Speaker 1: One Nation isn't the party of government, at least not yet.
[5:48] Speaker 1: And this is the first time we've seen this kind
[5:50] Speaker 1: of solidarity. But I do think there is a real
[5:54] Speaker 1: need now for news organizations in Australia to stand together
[5:58] Speaker 1: and say, look, we're not going to put up with this.
[6:00] Speaker 1: Whatever we think about one another and however competitive we are,
[6:04] Speaker 1: we need to recognize that for the sake of everybody,
[6:07] Speaker 1: for the sake of not just the news organizations, but
[6:09] Speaker 1: for the sake of our democracy, we need to stand
[6:12] Speaker 1: together and make it very clear to governments and politicians
[6:15] Speaker 1: and political parties, not just Pauline Hanson, but right across
[6:18] Speaker 1: the board, that you don't get to pick and choose
[6:20] Speaker 1: who gets to cover you. That's just not a part
[6:23] Speaker 1: of how a democracy should work.
[6:26] Speaker 2: And as you say, One Nation, it's a minor political
[6:29] Speaker 2: party making decisions about who covers its own events. But
[6:33] Speaker 2: you've written that Australia shouldn't look at what Trump is
[6:36] Speaker 2: doing in the US and assume that that couldn't happen
[6:39] Speaker 2: here in Australia. So why not?
[6:42] Speaker 1: Because what we've seen in the United States, and remember,
[6:45] Speaker 1: we've so often looked to the US as a bastion
[6:47] Speaker 1: of freedom of speech, of press freedom. After all, it
[6:50] Speaker 1: has that storied First Amendment to its constitution that guarantees
[6:55] Speaker 1: freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of association
[6:58] Speaker 1: and so on. We don't have anything like that. We
[7:04] Speaker 1: don't have anywhere near the kind of traditions, we don't
[7:08] Speaker 1: have anywhere near the kind of legal traditions backstops that
[7:11] Speaker 1: exist in the united states and we need to be
[7:12] Speaker 1: very mindful of the way in which erosion of these
[7:17] Speaker 1: democratic norms can lead to the erosion of our democracy itself.
[7:24] Speaker 2: Coming up if an australian government shut journalists out here
[7:28] Speaker 2: what would they have to fall back on Peter, when
[7:39] Speaker 2: Trump has launched attacks on the media in the US,
[7:43] Speaker 2: those news organisations, they can go to court, they can
[7:46] Speaker 2: invoke the First Amendment. But what protection would an Australian
[7:51] Speaker 2: outlet have in the same situation?
[7:53] Speaker 1: We don't. The most we have is what's known as
[7:57] Speaker 1: the implied freedom of political communication. And this is something
[8:00] Speaker 1: that the High Court back in the late 1990s has
[8:03] Speaker 1: inferred between the lines of our constitution. It's looked at
[8:06] Speaker 1: our constitution and said, well, we have a system of
[8:09] Speaker 1: representative democracy, and because you can't have representative democracy without
[8:13] Speaker 1: freedom of political communication, we can kind of read it
[8:15] Speaker 1: between the lines. But that is a very, very weak backstop.
[8:20] Speaker 1: And in fact, there was one High Court judge who,
[8:23] Speaker 1: in a ruling from 2021, actually said that he wasn't
[8:26] Speaker 1: even entirely sure if that implied freedom actually existed. We
[8:30] Speaker 1: also know that in certain critical cases, the implied freedom
[8:34] Speaker 1: hasn't worked. It hasn't done its job to protect media freedom.
[8:37] Speaker 1: And I'm thinking in particular of the case of the
[8:39] Speaker 1: ABC when the ABC went to the federal court to
[8:42] Speaker 1: appeal against the federal police warrant that was used to
[8:46] Speaker 1: investigate the Afghan files story back in 2019.
[8:49] Speaker 5: Federal police left the ABC Sydney headquarters yesterday afternoon with
[8:53] Speaker 5: a series of files after an eight-hour raid over allegations
[8:57] Speaker 5: the broadcaster had published classified material. And the ABC has
[9:01] Speaker 5: described this event as a savage assault on the media.
[9:05] Speaker 1: And then the judge said, listen, you're asking me to
[9:07] Speaker 1: chuck out a perfectly valid warrant written against a very
[9:09] Speaker 1: clear statute, and you're asking me to throw that out
[9:12] Speaker 1: using something that you vaguely inferred from between the lines
[9:15] Speaker 1: of the Constitution. He said, that doesn't really wash. And that,
[9:19] Speaker 1: I think, demonstrates just how fragile this implied freedom really is.
[9:24] Speaker 1: And remember, we are the only liberal democracy in the
[9:27] Speaker 1: world that doesn't have press freedom laws. written into either
[9:31] Speaker 1: our constitution or a bill of rights. And that, I think,
[9:34] Speaker 1: is a really critical problem for us.
[9:37] Speaker 3: So we're weaker off even than the US, is what
[9:39] Speaker 3: you're saying?
[9:39] Speaker 1: Much weaker. All we rely on is this implied freedom
[9:43] Speaker 1: and the history of conventions which support press freedom. But
[9:47] Speaker 1: there is nothing explicitly in law that says it is
[9:50] Speaker 1: a part of our democratic system.
[9:52] Speaker 3: And so, I mean, why is that?
[9:54] Speaker 2: Why do we not have more protections for journalists? Why have,
[9:57] Speaker 2: you know, along the way, major parties not come on
[10:00] Speaker 2: board with that idea?
[10:01] Speaker 1: It's a hard one to answer. I mean, obviously, we
[10:04] Speaker 1: know Australia's history of constitutional reform. It's always been very,
[10:09] Speaker 1: very difficult for us to get constitutional reform over the
[10:12] Speaker 1: line and And I find it hard to imagine circumstances
[10:15] Speaker 1: in which the Australian public would agree to recognise the media,
[10:18] Speaker 1: given the kind of difficult relationship that we currently have.
[10:22] Speaker 1: And I also think we haven't had the kind of
[10:25] Speaker 1: crisis that would force us to take a good hard
[10:30] Speaker 1: look and think about the importance of press freedoms. And
[10:34] Speaker 1: I think we came close to recognising the issue when
[10:38] Speaker 1: the AFP raids happened in 2019. There was a lot
[10:41] Speaker 1: of existential angst then. There were two parliamentary inquiries that
[10:45] Speaker 1: made a host of recommendations to strengthen press freedom, but
[10:48] Speaker 1: nothing really came of that.
[10:50] Speaker 6: Journalists who were targets of police raids would be given
[10:52] Speaker 6: new protections under recommendations made by an important parliamentary inquiry
[10:57] Speaker 6: into media freedoms. Its long-awaited report calls for stricter procedures
[11:01] Speaker 6: for the issuing of warrants on national security grounds. But
[11:04] Speaker 6: at rejected calls by media organisations, they'd be allowed to
[11:07] Speaker 6: challenge the warrants before they're issued.
[11:09] Speaker 1: Now, the point that I've been trying to make is
[11:11] Speaker 1: that it's impossible to tell the stories not told as
[11:14] Speaker 1: a result of the way that a lot of the
[11:16] Speaker 1: overbearing legislation suppresses press freedom. We are incredibly heavily legislated
[11:22] Speaker 1: when it comes to national security laws. We've got more
[11:25] Speaker 1: national security laws since 9-11 than any other country on earth.
[11:28] Speaker 1: And in all sorts of ways, that's limited the work
[11:31] Speaker 1: that journalists are able to do. It's exposed journalist sources.
[11:34] Speaker 1: It's frightened a lot of otherwise important investigations because of
[11:38] Speaker 1: the risks that news organizations are undertaking when they do
[11:41] Speaker 1: these things. And so even though we're not seeing journalists
[11:46] Speaker 1: dragged off in manacles, we know that the law is
[11:48] Speaker 1: working as it's intended, and that is as a deterrent. Yeah.
[11:52] Speaker 2: Tell me how that could change under a Media Freedom Act.
[11:54] Speaker 2: What could that look like? What could that allow?
[11:57] Speaker 1: What we're advocating for is, and we've put together a
[11:59] Speaker 1: draft bill that we're planning to publish later this year,
[12:02] Speaker 1: what we're advocating for is not the right for journalists
[12:05] Speaker 1: to publish whatever they want, whenever they want, but we
[12:08] Speaker 1: want there to be a positive obligation to recognise the
[12:12] Speaker 1: public interest in the work that journalists do alongside the
[12:17] Speaker 1: public interest in protecting sensitive information. Now, sometimes, perhaps even
[12:21] Speaker 1: most of the time, courts might decide that it's important
[12:24] Speaker 1: to protect the information from getting out. But there will
[12:28] Speaker 1: be times when the public interest in exposing that information
[12:33] Speaker 1: trumps the public interest in keeping it hidden. And I
[12:36] Speaker 1: want the courts to have an obligation to recognize that
[12:39] Speaker 1: public interest and weigh those two competing interests together.
[12:43] Speaker 2: Can you tell me any more about how it would
[12:45] Speaker 2: better protect journalists from things like those police raids on
[12:49] Speaker 2: the ABC that we were talking about?
[12:52] Speaker 1: Yeah, one of the things that we want, and we've
[12:54] Speaker 1: been very careful not to try anything that hasn't been
[12:56] Speaker 1: or propose anything that hasn't been tested. In the United Kingdom,
[13:00] Speaker 1: they've got what they call the PACE Act, the Police
[13:03] Speaker 1: and Criminal Evidence Act, and that gives journalists the right
[13:07] Speaker 1: to contest warrants with the point that they're issued. Our
[13:11] Speaker 1: journalists are advised that a warrant is being sought and
[13:14] Speaker 1: they have the opportunity to go before the court and say, look,
[13:16] Speaker 1: here's why there is a public interest in the work
[13:19] Speaker 1: that we're doing. We need to be able to protect
[13:21] Speaker 1: our sources. We need to be able to go ahead
[13:23] Speaker 1: and continue the investigation. We think there is an overriding
[13:26] Speaker 1: public interest here and we want something similar to that.
[13:29] Speaker 1: So in the case of the ABC raids, the ABC
[13:32] Speaker 1: would have a chance to go before a judge and say, listen,
[13:34] Speaker 1: we're reporting on allegations of war crimes by Australian special forces.
[13:38] Speaker 1: There is a very, very clear and compelling public interest
[13:41] Speaker 1: in this. We haven't published anything and we're not going
[13:43] Speaker 1: to publish anything that would genuinely damage national security. You
[13:48] Speaker 1: need to back off. And although I can't speak for
[13:50] Speaker 1: a judge, I think if I was sitting on the bench,
[13:52] Speaker 1: I'd find that a pretty compelling argument.
[13:55] Speaker 2: And there is this tension or irony even in the
[13:59] Speaker 2: fact that we want press freedom to be able to
[14:01] Speaker 2: freely interrogate government, but you need government support to get
[14:04] Speaker 2: an act like this over the line.
[14:05] Speaker 3: How optimistic are you of that?
[14:09] Speaker 1: It's a really interesting question. I think, in principle, politicians
[14:15] Speaker 1: across the board recognise and understand and pay lip service
[14:19] Speaker 1: to the idea of press freedom and recognise the importance
[14:24] Speaker 1: of what we're arguing for. There is a bit of
[14:27] Speaker 1: sensitivity around the notion that perhaps this might in some
[14:32] Speaker 1: way undermine national security, although in our argument we think
[14:35] Speaker 1: this will enhance national security. We think that You know,
[14:38] Speaker 1: national security is about protecting the integrity of our political
[14:41] Speaker 1: system as well as the integrity of specific government information.
[14:45] Speaker 1: And clearly, free media is a part of the integrity
[14:47] Speaker 1: of that system. And we need to make sure that
[14:51] Speaker 1: it's safe and protected. And I think sometimes we need
[14:58] Speaker 1: the crisis. We need a moment like this. to draw
[15:02] Speaker 1: attention to the issues, to make Australians, not just politicians,
[15:06] Speaker 1: but Australians as well, recognise or understand that in fact
[15:10] Speaker 1: it's not as stable as we might imagine, that press
[15:14] Speaker 1: freedom is quite fragile in Australia and that, as we've
[15:17] Speaker 1: seen in the case of One Nation, politicians actually can
[15:22] Speaker 1: and have shut out independent news organisations from their reporting
[15:27] Speaker 1: and that if we don't step in to do something now,
[15:31] Speaker 1: then we run the risk of seeing it eroded over time.
[15:37] Speaker 3: Peter, thank you so much for your time.
[15:39] Speaker 1: It's been great to chat with.
[15:44] Speaker 6: You.
[15:57] Speaker 3: Also in the news... The federal government has launched an
[16:00] Speaker 3: urgent task force after an OpenAI artificial intelligence agent gained
[16:05] Speaker 3: unauthorised access to a Medicare statistics portal.
[16:08] Speaker 2: The agent accessed both public and non-public files in June,
[16:11] Speaker 2: although the government has described the breach as minor and
[16:14] Speaker 2: says no personal information is believed to have been accessed.
[16:18] Speaker 2: The task force will examine how the breach happened and
[16:20] Speaker 2: whether any offences were committed, with Anthony Albanese criticising OpenAI
[16:25] Speaker 2: for taking almost three months to notify the government. And
[16:30] Speaker 2: Australia's unemployment rate has risen to 4.6% in August, up
[16:34] Speaker 2: from 4.5%.
[16:35] Speaker 3: In July, its highest level since the pandemic.
[16:38] Speaker 2: Economists say the softer jobs market is unlikely to stop
[16:41] Speaker 2: the Reserve Bank raising interest rates next week, with inflation
[16:45] Speaker 2: still above target.
[16:46] Speaker 3: I'm Ruby Jones.
[16:47] Speaker 2: This is 7am.
[16:48] Speaker 3: Thanks for listening.
[16:52] Speaker 6: Thank you.

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