News update for Tue 22 April 2025
Your trusted guide to the top independent news and views of the day...
11 days until the May 3 federal election
Welcome to your TrueNorth news update where every weekday afternoon we share curated articles from Australia’s independent news media sector.
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Scroll down for the news and views you need to know today…
TODAY’S BREAKING NEWS UPDATES: See all the breaking news of the day through The Guardian here - Amy Remeikis for The Australia Institute here - and through 6 News here
‘Copied the MAGA model’: The ‘grassroots’ lobby group funded by some of Australia’s richest - The Good Weekend
It claims to be a “grassroots” group promoting free speech and common-sense policy to ordinary Aussies. But behind Advance’s propaganda machine – and its deluge of disinformation – are links to the far right in the US.
Advance appeared at first to be an anomaly. But it is perhaps best understood as one part of a much larger ecosystem, an international web of neoliberal think tanks centred around an American non-profit organisation called the Atlas Economic Research Foundation.
Read more in The Good Weekend (paywall)
Also read >
Fossil fuel companies ‘poisoned the well’ of public debate with climate disinformation. Here’s how Australia can break free - The Conversation
The Murdoch media’s attack on the teals - The Saturday Paper (paywall)
Do teals mostly vote with the Greens? It depends on whose pamphlets you believe - Crikey (paywall)
The think-tanks are killing democracy. Australia is next - The Politics
Pamphlets attacking Allegra Spender for being 'weak' on antisemitism investigated - The ABC
Dark Money: Labor and Liberal join forces in attacks on Teals and Greens - Wendy Bacon for Michael West Media
Saul Griffith on how the major parties could get to net zero - 7am Podcast
In a coastal corner of Australia, scientist Saul Griffith has been quietly working away on a plan to turn 500 households completely off fossil fuels. He hopes that what he achieves there can act as a blueprint for the rest of the country. But for that to become a reality, the federal government would need to drastically increase their commitment to renewable energy. Today, chief scientist at Rewiring Australia, Saul Griffith, on the electrification already underway – and what both sides of politics are promising for our energy future.
Also >
Why Labor can’t ignore Peter Dutton’s gas reservation policy - The New Daily
Australia’s student strikers for climate believed they could change their future. Where are they now? - The Guardian
Santos wins final approval for Barossa gas project as environment advocates condemn ‘climate bomb’ - The Guardian
Ross Gittins: Home truths: Housing policies are for show, but one side at least gets the problem - Pearls and Irritations
If you think this sounds twisted, it is. The best thing about the two sides’ various promises to help young people afford to buy their first home is the way it has provoked the nation’s economists to rise in condemnation of those schemes’ wrongheadedness. They look like they’ll help, but most of them are more likely to end up making homes less affordable rather than more.
And the parties know it. They know it because their economic advisers wouldn’t fail to make sure they knew. All economists know it, but this is the first time so many have come out and said it, joining independent economist Saul Eslake, who’s been saying it at every opportunity for decades.
Read more from Ross Gittins for Pearls and Irritations
Also read >
Labor and Liberal housing policies are not enough. Two broken systems need fixing first - Alan Kohler for The ABC
Netherlands a ‘cautionary tale’ for Coalition’s mortgage deduction scheme, expert warns - The Guardian
Sowing doubt in Dutton’s Dickson - Karen Middleton for Inside Story
Is America an Autocracy Now? - The stakes of naming, and the reality of process - Lucid
"When do we know we've become an authoritarian state? What is the tipping point when we must say: we are no longer a democracy?" These are among the most common questions I receive from the public and members of the Lucid community. It is part of human nature to want to make sense of what we are living through by giving it a name. And when what we are living through is the destruction of our democracy, the naming is also empowering, because we can take inspiration from others who have been in our situation, and apply their hard-earned wisdom to our own place and time.
Read more from Ruth Ben-Ghiat for Lucid
Laura Tingle: Whoever wins the federal election on May 3 will face a fork in the road for Australia's future - ABC News
There's been a lot of commentary in the past few weeks about the way Donald Trump and foreign policy have intervened in, or loomed over, the Australian election campaign.
We aren't really used to it, and it shows.
The "debate" veers between a schoolyard discussion about who can be besties with the loudmouth bully, and a slightly uneasy, and not quite addressed noting of the fact that, er, the world trade system and geopolitics are in a state of complete upheaval.
The way our relationships with the United States and China might play out amid this upheaval tends to be seen in bilateral terms.
Read more from Laura Tingle for The ABC
Also read > Whoever wins Australia’s election will need to work with the Senate. Here’s how it could look - Ben Raue for The Guardian
Tim Dunlop: The eternal vulnerability of democratic governments - The Future of Everything
America teaches us many lessons about the vulnerability of democracies, but surely a key lesson we should learn at the moment is that gentle, steady-as-she-goes centrism is no match for a determined movement of authoritarianism. We should also learn that people are not afraid of big policies, big change, and that they are looking for real alternatives to the sort of neoliberal managerialism that parties like the Democrats (and our own Labor Party) have come to embody. People know the last forty-odd years of policy has backed us into a cul de sac of massive inequality from which has arisen nearly all the problems that beset us and that this needs to be addressed, and they want something done about it.
Read more from Tim Dunlop for The Future of Everything
Today’s cartoon by Matt Golding
TODAY’S BREAKING NEWS UPDATES: See all the breaking news of the day through The Guardian here - Amy Remeikis for The Australia Institute here - and through 6 News here
Join the new Boiling Point community - where we’re growing a group of politically informed Australians in the lead up to the 2025 federal election. See details and sign up here.
David McBride: "The System" needs to change. War crimes whistleblower David McBride - Michael West Media
Afghan war crimes whistleblower David McBride languishes in prison while war crimes perpetrators roam free.
As most of MWM readers will know, I’m presently serving a five-year sentence for the crime of being a whistleblower. From within my prison, I watch the much vaunted National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) continue to do nothing, the Office of Special Investigator (OSI) continue its fumbling, and Ben Roberts-Smith travels the world.
Read more from David McBride for Michael West Media
Amy Remeikis: Dutton is asking voters to look backward. That's the wrong question - The New Daily
In October 1980, before almost half the people voting in this election were born, US president Ronald Reagan posed what became one of the defining questions of modern politics:
Are you better off today than you were four years ago?
Reagan would go on to beat Jimmy Carter in the election that year and, along with British prime minister Margaret Thatcher, usher in the neo-liberal era to western democracies.
It’s been a standard in campaigns ever since. Peter Dutton has revived it for the 2025 Australian campaign.
Read more from Amy Remeikis for The New Daily
Loose units and losing momentum: Dutton’s campaign continues to go downhill - New Politics Podcast
Election 2025: Dutton Falters As Albo Obfuscates - Fourth Estate Podcast
Could a rise in ‘anatomical drawings’ seal Peter Dutton’s fate? - Crikey (paywall)
Carole Cadwalladr: It’s not too late to stop Trump and the tech broligarchy from controlling our lives, but we must act now - The Guardian
The internet we’ve created, captured by big corporations and built on data tracking, was not inevitable. Nor is what’s coming next. And it’s why I wanted to write this piece. Because as hopeless as things are, there’s no inevitability to what comes next. It’s why I’m so appalled at the naivety of the British government, which, at the very moment that it should be seeking to strengthen UK national sovereignty against US tech power, is doing the exact opposite. This is not a partisan issue.
Read more from Carole Cadwalladr for The Guardian
Also read >
Fantasy Island: No Place for Tech Bro Enterprise - Sandy Plunkett
AI for a Just Future: From Personal Liberation to Societal Gain - Sue Barrett
Dangerous silence on gender-based violence this election as our political leaders fail to meet the moment - Women’s Agenda
Four women died last week, allegedly at the hands of men.
Claire Austin, 38, died after trying to escape a domestic violence situation in Sydney’s east. Louise Hunt was found dead after a house fire in regional Queensland; her husband has been charged with her murder. Kim Duncan, 65, was killed in a drive-by shooting in Ambarvale, with police still investigating the intended target. And on Friday morning, a woman’s body was found in a burnt-out car in Beverly Hills, Sydney — abducted from her home hours earlier in front of her young son.
Each of them was more than a statistic. Each should still be alive.
Yet not one question about gender-based violence was raised in the first two leaders’ debates of the 2025 federal election.
Also read > For a moment, violence against women got some election attention - Women’s Agenda
Theatre of the absurd: Labor and Liberals on a unity ticket on every key issue — and guess who benefits - Crikey
Run through the big issues facing Australia, and you’ll find extensive bipartisanship on how they should be addressed — or ignored. That’s the way some powerful interests want it.
If you change the government, you change the country, Paul Keating famously said. But how much change would there be on May 3 if there’s a change of government?
On every major issue — both the big policy challenges facing the country, and the issues the parties insist are the really important ones — Labor and the Coalition are on a unity ticket, with only some trivial details over implementation separating them.
Read more from Bernard Keane for Crikey (paywall)
Also read > Labor MP ‘sick of seeing betting odds’ as he airs disappointment at Albanese government’s record on gambling ads - The Guardian
Dutton sinks fast as his cock-ups engulf him - The Politics
The opposition leader is drowning not waving as his campaign gaffes and shocking errors of judgment scupper his campaign.
Pre-poll voting starts today. And Peter Dutton is increasingly desperate. These two facts are not unrelated.
As we round the metaphorical bend and head down the straight to the May 3 finishing line of this election campaign, Dutton’s chances of realising his moment of destiny are fading fast. Remarkably, he keeps making the wrong calls.
Read more from David Hardaker for The Politics
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Quick Links…
Early voting opens in the federal election – but it brings some problems for voters and parties - The Conversation
Vets exposing shocking animal welfare breaches at Australian export abattoirs face ‘enormous risk’ - The Guardian
For young voters, what does Labor represent? - The Last Place on Earth
What’s the historical evidence for sophomore surge? - The Tally Room
Silence is no response to slaughter, so at least recognise Palestine - Pearls and Irritations
Inside the bitter billion-dollar feud tearing Gina Rinehart’s family apart - The Guardian
Olympian turned politician: Zali Steggall on holding power to account - The Women's Agenda Podcast
Who will be the next pope? Some potential candidates to succeed Francis - The Guardian
What would Australia be willing to go to war over? This needs to be made clear in our defence strategy - The Conversation
TODAY’S BREAKING NEWS UPDATES: See all the breaking news of the day through The Guardian here - Amy Remeikis for The Australia Institute here - and through 6 News here
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You’re up to date for Tuesday the 22nd of April. See you tomorrow.
TODAY’S BREAKING NEWS UPDATES: See all the breaking news of the day through The Guardian here - Amy Remeikis for The Australia Institute here - and through 6 News here
Join the new Boiling Point community - where we’re growing a group of politically informed Australians in the lead up to the 2025 federal election. See details and sign up here.
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