Philippa Kaur

In his second term, President Donald Trump has not taken many actions that draw near-universal praise from across the political spectrum. But there is at least one of these political anomalies, and it illustrates the broad appeal of environmental protection and conservation projects – particularly when it concerns an ecosystem of vital importance to millions of Americans.

In May 2025, Trump issued a presidential memorandum supporting the construction of a physical barrier that is key to keeping invasive carp out of the Great Lakes. These fish have made their way up the Mississippi River system and could have dire ecological consequences if they enter the Great Lakes.

It was not a given that Trump would back this project, which had long been supported by environmental and conservation organizations. But two very different strategies from two Democratic governors – both potential presidential candidates in 2028 – reflected the importance of the Great Lakes to America.

As a water policy and politics scholar focused on the Great Lakes, I see this development not only as an environmental and conservation milestone, but also a potential pathway for more political unity in the U.S.

A feared invasion

Perhaps nothing alarms Great Lakes ecologists more than the potential for invasive carp from Asia to establish a breeding population in the Great Lakes. These fish were intentionally introduced in the U.S. Southeast by private fish farm and wastewater treatment operators as a means to control algae in aquaculture and sewage treatment ponds. Sometime in the 1990s, the fish escaped from those ponds and moved rapidly up the Mississippi River system, including into the Illinois River, which connects to the Great Lakes.

Sometimes said to “breed like mosquitoes and eat like hogs,” these fish can consume up to 40% of their body weight each day, outcompeting many native species and literally sucking up other species and food sources.

Studies of Lake Erie, for example, predict that if the carp enter and thrive, they could make up approximately one-third of the fish biomass of the entire lake within 20 years, replacing popular sportfishing species such as walleye and other ecologically and economically important species.

Invasive carp are generally not eaten in the U.S. and are not desirable for sportfishing. In fact, silver carp have a propensity to jump up to 10 feet out of the water when startled by a boat motor. That can make parts of the Illinois River, which is packed with the invasive fish, almost impossible to fish or even maneuver a boat.

Look out! Silver carp fly out of the water, obstructing boats and hitting people trying to enjoy a river in Indiana.

The Brandon Road Lock and Dam solution

Originally, the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River were not connected to each other. But in 1900, the city of Chicago connected them to avoid sending its sewage into Lake Michigan, from which the city draws its drinking water.

The most complete way to block the carp from invading the Great Lakes would be to undo that connection – but that would recreate sewage and flooding issues for Chicago, or require other expensive infrastructure upgrades. The more practical, short-term alternative is to modify the historic Brandon Road Lock and Dam in Joliet, Illinois, by adding several obstacles that together would block the carp from swimming farther upriver toward the Great Lakes.

The barrier, estimated to cost US$1.15 billion, was authorized by Congress in 2020 and 2022 after many years of intense planning and negotiations. For the first phase of construction, the project received $226 million in federal money from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to complement $114 million in state funding – $64 million from Michigan and $50 million from Illinois.

On the first day of Trump’s second term, however, he paused a wide swath of federal funding, including funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. And that’s when two different political strategies emerged.

A brief documentary explains the construction of a connection between the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River basin.

Pritzker vs. Whitmer vs. Trump

Illinois, a state that has voted for the Democratic candidate in every presidential election since 1992, has the most financially at stake in the Brandon Road project because the project requires the state to acquire land and operate the barrier. When Trump issued his order, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, a Democrat, postponed the purchase of a key piece of land, blaming the “Trump Administration’s lack of clarity and commitment” to the project. Pritzker essentially dared Trump to be the reason for the collapse of the Great Lakes ecosystem and fisheries.

Another Democrat, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, a swing state with the most at stake economically and ecologically if these carp species enter the Great Lakes, took a very different approach. She went to the White House to talk with Trump about invasive carp and other issues. She defended her nonconfrontational approach to critics, though she also hid her face from cameras when Trump surprised her with an Oval Office press conference. When Trump visited Michigan, she stood beside him as they praised each other.

When Trump released the federal funding in early May, Pritzker kept up his adversarial language, saying he was “glad that the Trump administration heard our calls … and decided to finally meet their obligation.” Whitmer stayed more conciliatory, calling the funding decision a “huge win that will protect our Great Lakes and secure our economy.” She said she was “grateful to the president for his commitment.”

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer greets President Donald Trump as he arrives in her state in late April 2025.
AP Photo/Alex Brandon

Why unity on carp?

Whether coordinated or not, the net result of Pritzker’s and Whitmer’s actions drew praise from both sides of the aisle but was little noticed nationally.

Trump’s support for the project was a rare moment of political unity and an extremely unusual example of leading Democrats being on the same page as Trump. I attribute this surprising outcome to two key factors.

First, the Great Lakes region holds disproportionate power in presidential elections. Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania have backed the eventual winner in every presidential race for the past 20 years. This swing state power has been used by advocates and state political leaders to drive funding for Great Lakes protection for many years.

Second, Great Lakes are the uniting force in the region. According to polling from the International Joint Commission, the binational body charged with overseeing waterways that cross the U.S.-Canada border, there is “nearly unanimous support (96%) for the importance of government investment in Great Lakes protections” from residents of the region.

There aren’t any other issues with such high voter resonance, so politicians want to be sure Great Lakes voters are happy. For example, Vice President JD Vance has been particularly vocal about the Great Lakes. And Great Lakes restoration funding was one of the few things in the presidential budget that Democrats and Republicans agreed on.

Both Pritzker and Whitmer likely had state-based and national motivations in mind and big aspirations at stake.

Their combined effort has put the project back on track: As of May 12, 2025, Pritzker authorized Illinois to sign the land-purchase agreement he had paused back in February.

And perhaps the governors have identified a new area for unity in a divided United States: Conservation and environmental issues have broad public support, particularly when they involve iconic natural resources, shared values and popular outdoor pursuits such as fishing and boating. Even when political strategies diverge, the results can bring bipartisan satisfaction. More

Minor party preference flows for the federal election have been released, with Labor winning Greens preferences by 88.2–11.8, while the Coalition won One Nation preferences by 74.5–24.5. I also cover a SA state poll that gave Labor a massive 67–33 lead.

The Australian Electoral Commission’s results for the May 3 federal election now show how minor parties’ preferences flowed between Labor and the Coalition. The Greens won 12.2% of the national primary vote, and their preferences favoured Labor over the Coalition by 88.2–11.8. That’s a 2.5% preference flow gain for Labor since the 2022 election.

One Nation had 6.4% of primary votes. Their preferences favoured the Coalition over Labor by 74.5–25.5, a 10.2% preference flow gain for the Coalition. Independents made up 7.3% of primary votes, and their preferences favoured Labor by 67.2–32.8, a 3.4% gain for Labor.

Including Trumpet of Patriots (1.9% of primary votes) with others, others made up 7.7% of primary votes and their preferences favoured the Coalition by 57.3–42.7, a 0.6% gain for the Coalition since 2022 if United Australia Party (4.1% in 2022) is included with others then.

The AEC formally declared the poll by returning the writs on June 12. Results can be legally challenged within 40 days of this declaration, so by July 22.

In Bradfield, Teal Nicolette Boele only won by 26 votes against the Liberals, and this result could be challenged.

As the AEC does not want to disturb the ballot papers until any challenge is resolved by the courts, it is for now using an estimated two-party result in Bradfield (55.0–45.0 to the Liberals against Labor). Analyst Ben Raue believes this estimate is understating Labor in Bradfield by 4.4%.

If Raue is right, the current national two-party vote (55.22–44.78 to Labor) is very slightly understating Labor.

While One Nation’s preference shift helped the Coalition, there were compensatory shifts to Labor from Greens and independent voters. The combined primary vote for One Nation and Trumpet of Patriots was down 0.8% from 2022 to 8.3%, while independents were up 2.0%.

Applying 2022 election flows to primary votes at this election only overstates Labor by 0.1% compared to their actual two-party vote.

In my poll review article on June 5, I said respondent allocated preferences in final polls did not show a large gap in the Coalition’s favour from using 2022 election flows that had occurred in polls earlier in the year.

It’s likely that Labor’s share of preferences from Greens and Teal-type independents rose close to the election. People who voted for these candidates may have been disappointed with Labor’s environmental record, but both Peter Dutton and Donald Trump helped Labor with these people.

In the last term, the Greens were economically left-wing as well as pro-environment. Voters who supported the Greens because of their economic agenda are probably less likely to prefer the Coalition to Labor than environmental voters.

The Poll Bludger has a graph that shows that, in federal elections since 2004, Labor’s share of Greens preferences was at a record high this election, but their share of One Nation preferences was at a record low.

Weak Labor flows to Boele

In Bradfield, Labor preferences favoured Boele by 68.6–31.4 against the Liberals.There were 16 other seats where Labor preferences were distributed between the Coalition and a non-Coalition candidate. The Labor flow to Boele was the second weakest in such seats. This weak flow almost cost Boele Bradfield.

Independent Nicolette Boele’s win in the seat of Bradfield could yet be challenged.
Dean Lewins/AAP

The only seat that had a weaker Labor preference flow to a non-Coalition candidate was Maranoa, where the non-Coalition candidate was One Nation. Labor preferences in Maranoa split 57.9–42.1 to the Liberal National Party against One Nation. In 13 of the 17 seats, Labor preferences flowed at over 75% rates to the non-Coalition candidate.

In early April, the ABC reported Boele had made a crude sexual remark to a 19-year-old employee at a hair salon after receiving a haircut and was banned from that salon. This may explain the weaker preference flow from Labor voters.

Weak Greens flows to Teals in Teal vs Labor contests

There were three seats where the final two were Labor and a Teal independent: Bean, Franklin and Fremantle. In Bean and Fremantle, the Liberals recommended preferences to the Teal on their how to vote material, but not in Franklin.

Labor held all three seats, but only by 50.3–49.7 in Bean and 50.7–49.3 in Fremantle. Labor won much more easily in Franklin, by 57.8–42.2, where they benefited from Liberal how to vote cards.

In Bean, Greens preferences only favoured Teal Jessie Price by 50.6–49.4 over Labor, while Liberal preferences favoured her by 80.0–20.0. In Fremantle, Greens preferences favoured Teal Kate Hulett by 52.9–47.1, while Liberal preferences favoured her by 76.5–23.5. In Franklin, Greens preferences favoured Teal Peter George by 53.8–46.2.

In the ACT seat of Bean, Greens preferences favoured the Teal candidate, but only just.
Lukas Coch/AAP

In Bean and Fremantle, had Greens preferences been stronger for the Teal, Labor would have lost to a more pro-environment candidate. Perhaps Labor benefited on Greens preferences owing to the Greens’ more economic left-wing agenda.

And a national Morgan poll, conducted June 2–22 from a sample of 3,957, gave Labor a 58–42 lead, unchanged from the previous Morgan poll in May. Primary votes were 37.5% Labor (up 0.5), 31% Coalition (steady), 12% Greens (up 0.5), 6% One Nation (steady) and 13.5% for all Others (down one).

By 43–41.5, voters thought the country was headed in the right direction, the first time right direction has led since February 2023. The overall net +1.5 rating is +48 with Labor voters, +11.5 with Greens, -43 with Coalition voters, -80.5 with One Nation voters and -17.5 with all Others.

Labor holds massive lead in SA

The next South Australian state election will be held in March 2026. A YouGov poll for The Adelaide Advertiser, conducted May 15–28 from a sample of 903, gave Labor a massive 67–33 lead over the Liberals (54.6–45.4 to Labor at the March 2022 election). Primary votes were 48% Labor, 21% Liberals, 14% Greens, 7% One Nation, 8% independents and 2% others.

If the results at next March’s election reflect this poll, the Liberals would hold just two of the 47 lower house seats on a uniform swing. It would be easily their worst result in SA state history.

In Australian electoral history, there has only been one bigger landslide: when Western Australian Labor defeated the Liberals and Nationals by 69.7–30.3 at the March 2021 state election.

Socialist likely to be next New York City mayor

I covered today’s AEST New York City Democratic mayoral primary election for The Poll Bludger. While preferences won’t be tabulated until next Tuesday, the socialist Zohran Mamdani leads former New York governor Andrew Cuomo by 43.5–36.4 on primary votes, and is virtually certain to win. As the Democratic nominee, Mamdani is likely to win the November general election.

The article also covers Donald Trump’s ratings and polls in Israel. More

On June 21, the United States launched airstrikes on three Iranian nuclear facilities – Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan – pounding deeply buried centrifuge sites with bunker-busting bombs.

Conducted jointly with Israel, the operation took place without formal congressional authorisation, drawing sharp criticism from lawmakers that it was unconstitutional and “unlawful”.

Read more:
Why the US strikes on Iran are illegal and can set a troubling precedent

Much of the political debate has centred on whether the US is being pulled into “another Middle East war”.

The New York Times’ Nick Kristof weighed in on the uncertainties following the US’ surprise bombing of Iran and Tehran’s retaliation.

Even US Vice President JD Vance understood the unease, stating:

People are right to be worried about foreign entanglement after the last 25 years of idiotic foreign policy.

These reactions have revived comparisons with George W. Bush’s 2003 invasion of Iraq: a Republican president launching military action on the basis of flimsy weapons of mass destruction (WMD) evidence.

Hauntingly familiar?

While the surface similarity is tempting, the comparison may in fact obscure more about President Donald Trump than it reveals.

Comparisons to the Iraq War

In 2003, Bush ordered a full-scale invasion of Iraq based on flawed intelligence, claiming Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein possessed WMDs. And while the war was extremely unpopular across the world, it did have bipartisan congressional support.

The invasion toppled Iraq’s regime in just a few weeks.

What followed was a brutal conflict and almost a decade of US occupation. The war triggered the rise of militant jihadism and a horrific sectarian conflict that reverberates today.

So far, Trump’s one-off strikes on Iran bear little resemblance to the 2003 Iraq intervention.

These were precision strikes within the context of a broader Iran-Israel war, designed to target Iran’s nuclear program.

And, so far, there appears to be little appetite for a full-scale military invasion or “boots on the ground”, and regime change seems unlikely despite some rumblings from both Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Yet the comparison to Iraq persists, especially among audiences suspicious of repeated US military interventions in the Middle East. But poorly considered analogies carry costs.

For one, the Iraq comparison sheds little light on Trump’s foreign policy.

Read more:
The US has entered the Israel-Iran war. Here are 3 scenarios for what might happen next

Trump’s foreign policy

To better understand the recent strikes on Iran, we need to look at Trump’s broader foreign policy.

Much has been made of his “America first” mantra, a complex mix of prioritising domestic interests, questioning international agreements, and challenging traditional alliances.

Others, including Trump himself, have often touted his “no war” approach, pointing to large-scale military withdrawals from Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq,and the fact he had not started a new war.

But beyond this, Trump has increased US military spending and frequently used his office to conduct targeted strikes on adversaries – especially across the Middle East.

For example, in 2017 and 2018, Trump ordered airstrikes on a Syrian airbase and chemical weapons facilities. In both instances, he bypassed Congress and used precision air power to target weapons infrastructure without pursuing regime change.

Also, from 2017 to 2021, Trump authorised US support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen, enabling airstrikes that targeted militant cells but also led to mass civilian casualties.

Trump’s policy was the subject of intense bipartisan opposition, culminating in the first successful congressional invocation of the War Powers Resolution – though it was ultimately vetoed by Trump.

And in 2020, Trump launched a sequence of attacks on Iranian assets in Iraq. This included a drone strike that killed senior Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani.

Again, these attacks were conducted without congressional support. The decision triggered intense bipartisan backlash and concerns about escalation without oversight.

While such attacks are not without precedent – think back to former US President Barack Obama’s intervention in Libya or Joe Biden’s targeting of terrorist assets – the scale and veracity of Trump’s attacks on the Middle East are much more useful as a framework to understanding the recent attacks on Iran than any reference to the 2003 Iraq war.

What this reveals about Trump

It is crucial to scrutinise any use of force. But while comparing the 2025 Iran strikes to Iraq in 2003 may be rhetorically powerful, it is analytically weak.

A better path is to situate these events within Trump’s broader political style.

He acts unilaterally and with near-complete impunity, disregarding traditional constraints and operating outside established norms and oversight.

This is just as true for attacks on foreign adversaries as it is for the domestic policy arena.

For example, Trump recently empowered agencies such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to operate with sweeping discretion in immigration enforcement, bypassing legal and judicial oversight.

Trump also uses policy as spectacle, designed to send shockwaves through the domestic or foreign arenas and project dominance to both friend and foe.

In this way, Trump’s dramatic attacks on Iran have some parallels to his unilateral imposition of tariffs on international trade. Both are abrupt, disruptive and framed as a demonstration of strength rather than a way to create a mutually beneficial solution.

Finally, Trump is more than willing to use force as an instrument of power rather than as a last resort. This is just as true for Iran as it is for the US people.

The recent deployment of US Marines to quell protests in Los Angeles reveals a similar impulse: military intervention as a first instinct in the absence of a broader strategy to foster peace.

To truly understand and respond to Trump’s Iran strikes, we need to move beyond sensationalist analogies and recognise a more dangerous reality. This is not the start of another Iraq; it’s the continuation of a presidency defined by impulsive power, unchecked force and a growing disdain for democratic constraint. More

President Donald Trump’s second term as president will surely go down in history, though of course, just six months into his four-year term, much of this story has yet to be written.

But it is already clear that most Americans will not be able to read exactly what Trump has said, as they have with previous presidents, during his current term in the White House.

The White House has removed the official transcripts of Trump’s public remarks from its government website, NBC News reported in May 2025, replacing the written transcripts with select videos and audio of Trump’s public appearances.

White House officials told NBC News that this switch should help people get a fuller, more consistent and accurate sense of Trump by watching and listening to him, rather than reading what he says verbatim at official events.

Government stenographers are also still recording and transcribing all of Trump’s remarks, though these are no longer being published on the White House’s website or elsewhere. It is not clear where or how those transcriptions are being saved.

For years, translators, reporters, students, historians and presidential scholars like me have used official presidential transcripts to understand a president’s exact words and track government decisions. Without these written transcripts, it becomes harder to get the full story of exactly what the president has done or said.

President Donald Trump, joined by members of his cabinet, delivers a statement on natural disaster preparedness in the Oval Office at the White House on June 10, 2025.
Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

A partial history

A nation’s history is etched in its records. The preservation of official proceedings provides the bedrock for understanding a country’s past and navigating its future.

A growing chorus of historians, public officials and transparency advocates is raising alarms about how the Trump administration is curating and potentially manipulating the government’s records and actions.

The White House’s recent decision to not share official, written transcripts of what the president has said is not the first time this issue has emerged under Trump.

As I wrote in 2021, the first Trump administration did not consistently submit the transcripts of the president’s political rally speeches to the National Archives, as was the custom with previous presidents. The National Archives is an independent government agency within the executive branch that preserves the nation’s historical records.

This official recordkeeping is important, and it’s more than a tradition – it’s a legal obligation. A law called the Presidential Records Act of 1978 says that everything a president does in office – from making speeches to writing emails – belongs to the public.

This includes not just formal speeches, but also public remarks and oral exchanges, which are traditionally included in a compilation of presidential documents.

My examination of this compilation for 2025 appears to show a gap in such records from mid-April 2025 onward. While the transcript of Trump’s full remarks when speaking with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni was published on this government site on April 18, for example, publicly available documents from May only include a checklist of White House press releases, a digest of White House announcements and a list of acts that the president signed into law.

In the absence of complete official records from government sources, external, independent organizations that also monitor the presidency, like The American Presidency Project at the University of California, Santa Barbara, have become crucial repositories.

The American Presidency Project diligently logs and, when transcripts are unavailable, provides video of public presidential messaging, striving to create as complete a record as possible for all curious viewers and readers.

Workers secure scaffolding on the side of the National Archives building in Washington on April 2, 2025.
Roberto Schmidt/AFP via Getty Images

Washington’s letters up in flames

The fight over keeping an honest record of presidents is a problem that comes up again and again in American history.

Perhaps the most powerful example of losing historical records comes from the country’s very first president, George Washington. He knew he was setting an example for all future presidents and kept very careful records. He wanted to leave a complete story of his life and his work for the future.

But there is very little of it left.

After Washington died, his wife, Martha, burned most of the letters they wrote to each other to keep their lives private.

Washington left his official papers to his nephew, Supreme Court Justice Bushrod Washington. But Bushrod gave many of them to Chief Justice John Marshall, who was writing a book about the president. The papers were not treated carefully, and many were damaged. To make matters worse, Bushrod would often tear off scraps of Washington’s writings and give them to people as souvenirs.

The result is that Americans have an incomplete picture of their first president. What now exists is a weaker version of the real story, created more by what other people did than by what Washington himself had planned.

Memories fade, and people are not around forever.

The main way that the U.S. can preserve its story is through accurate records. The current arguments over saving transcripts and official papers are about more than just rules. They are about the future. The records that Trump and other presidents leave behind will decide if people in the future see them as they really were, or just how they wanted others to view them. More

Even the most ardent supporters of the alliance with the United States – the notional foundation of Australian security for more than 70 years – must be having some misgivings about the second coming of Donald Trump.

If they’re not, they ought to read the two essays under review here. They offer a host of compelling reasons why a reassessment of the costs, benefits and possible future trajectory of the alliance is long overdue.

Review: After America: Australia and the new world order – Emma Shortis (Australia Institute Press), Hard New World: Our Post-American Future; Quarterly Essay 98 – Hugh White (Black Inc)

And yet, notwithstanding the cogency and timeliness of the critiques offered by Emma Shortis and Hugh White, it seems unlikely either of these will be read, much less acted upon, by those Shortis describes as the “mostly men in suits or uniforms, with no democratic accountability” who make security policy on our behalf.

White, emeritus professor of strategic studies at the ANU, was the principal author of Australia’s Defence White Paper in 2000. Despite having been a prominent member of the defence establishment, it is unlikely even his observations will prove any more palatable to its current incumbents.

Shortis, an historian and writer, is director of the Australia Institute’s International & Security Affairs Program. She is also a young woman, and while this shouldn’t matter, I suspect it does; at least to the “mostly men” who guard the nation from a host of improbable threats while ignoring what is arguably the most likely and important one: climate change.

The age of insecurity

To Shortis’s great credit, she begins her essay with a discussion of a “world on fire” in which the Trump administration is “locking in a bleaker future”.

Black Inc

This matters for both generational and geographical reasons. While we live in what is arguably the safest place on the planet, the country has the rare distinction of regularly experiencing once-in-100-year floods and droughts, sometimes simultaneously.

If that’s not a threat to security, especially of the young, it’s hard to know what is. It’s not one the current government or any other in this country has ever taken seriously enough.

White gives a rather perfunctory acknowledgement of this reality, reflecting an essentially traditional understanding of security – even if some of his conclusions will induce conniptions in Canberra.

While suggesting Trump is “the most prodigious liar in history”, White thinks he’s done Australia a favour by “puncturing the complacency” surrounding the alliance and our unwillingness to contemplate a world in which the US is not the reliable bedrock of security.

Shortis doubts the US ever was a trustworthy or reliable ally. This helps explain what she calls the “strategy of pre-emptive capitulation”, in which Australian policymakers fall over themselves to appear useful and supportive to their “great and powerful friend”. Former prime minister John Howard’s activation of the ANZUS alliance in the wake of September 11 and the disastrous decision to take part in the war in Iraq is perhaps the most egregious example of this unfortunate national proclivity.

White reminds us that all alliances are always transactional. Despite talk of a “history of mateship”, it’s vital to recognise if the great power doesn’t think something is in its “national interest”, it won’t be doing favours for allies. No matter how ingratiating and obliging they may be. While such observations may be unwelcome in Canberra, hopefully they won’t come as a revelation.

Black Inc

Although White is one of Australia’s most astute critics of the conventional wisdom, sceptics and aspiring peace-builders will find little to cheer in his analysis.

A good deal of his essay is taken up with the strategic situations in Europe and Asia. The discussion offers a penetrating, but rather despair-inducing insight into humanity’s collective predicament: only by credibly threatening our notional foes with nuclear Armageddon can we hope to keep the peace.

The problem we now face, White argues, is the likes of Russia and China are beginning to doubt America’s part in the “balance of resolve”. During the Cold War both sides were confident about the other side’s ability and willingness to blow them to pieces.

Now mutual destruction is less assured. While some of us might think this was a cause for cautious celebration, White suggests it fatally undermines the deterrent effect of nuclear weapons.

Even before Trump reappeared, this was a source of angst and/or uncertainty for strategists around the world. The principle underpinning international order in a world in which nuclear weapons exist, according to White, is that

a nuclear power can be stopped, but only by an unambiguous demonstration of willingness to fight a nuclear war to stop it.

Trump represents a suitably existential threat to this cheery doctrine. Europeans have belatedly recognised the US is no longer reliable and they are responsible for their own security.

Likewise, an ageing Xi Jinping may want to assure his position in China’s pantheon of great leaders by forcibly returning Taiwan to the motherland. It would be an enormous gamble, of course, but given Trump’s admiration for Xi, and Trump’s apparent willingness to see the world carved up into 19th century-style spheres of influence, it can’t be ruled out.

Australia’s options

If there’s one thing both authors agree on it’s that the AUKUS nuclear submarine project, the notional centrepiece of Australia’s future security is vastly overrated. It’s either a “disaster” (Shortis) or “insignificant” (White).

Likewise, they agree the US is only going to help Australia if it’s judged to be in America’s interest to do so. Recognising quite what an ill-conceived, ludicrously expensive, uncertain project AUKUS is, and just how unreliable a partner the US has become under Trump, might be a useful step on the path to national strategic self-awareness.

Shortis thinks some members of the Trump administration appear to be “aligned with Russia”. Tying ourselves closer to the US, she writes, “does not make us safer”. A major rethink of, and debate about, Australia’s security policy is clearly necessary.

Policymakers also ought to take seriously White’s arguments about the need to reconfigure the armed forces to defend Australia independently in an increasingly uncertain international environment.

Perhaps the hardest idea for Australia’s unimaginative strategic elites to grasp is that, as White points out,

Asia’s future, and Australia’s, will not be decided in Washington. It will be decided in Asia.

Former prime minister Paul Keating’s famous remark “Australia needs to seek its security in Asia rather than from Asia” remains largely unheeded. Despite plausible suggestions about developing closer strategic ties with Indonesia and even cooperating with China to offer leadership on climate change, some ideas remain sacrosanct and alternatives remain literally inconceivable.

Even if we take a narrow view of the nature of security – one revolving around possible military threats to Australia – US Defence Secretary Pete Hesgeth’s demands for greater defence spending on our part confirm White’s point that,

it is classic Trump to expect more and more from allies while he offers them less and less. This is the dead end into which our “America First” defence policy has led us.

Quite so.

Australia’s strategic elites have locked us into the foreign and strategic policies of an increasingly polarised, authoritarian and unpredictable regime.

But as Shortis observes, we cannot be confident about our ability, or the world’s for that matter, to “just ride Trump out”, and hope everything will return to normal afterwards.

It is entirely possible the international situation may get worse – possibly much worse – with or without Trump in the White House.

The reality is American democracy may not survive another four years of Trump and the coterie of startlingly ill-qualified, inhumane, self-promoting chancers who make up much of his administration.

A much-needed national debate

Both authors think attempts to “smother” a serious national debate about defence policy in Australia (White), and the security establishment’s obsession with secrecy (Shortis), are the exact opposite of what this country needs at this historical juncture. They’re right.

Several senior members of Australia’s security community have assured me if I only knew what they did I’d feel very differently about our strategic circumstances.

Really? One thing I do know is that we’re spending far too much time – and money! – acting on what Shortis describes as a “shallow and ungenerous understanding of what ‘security’ really is”.

We really could stop the conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza if Xi had a word with Putin and the US stopped supplying Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with the weapons and money to slaughter women and children. But climate change would still be coming to get us.

A bushfire in the Grampians National Park, Victoria.
State Control Centre/AAP

More importantly, global warming will get worse before it gets better, even in the unlikely event that the “international community” (whoever that may be) agrees on meaningful collective action tomorrow.

You may not agree with all of the ideas and suggestions contained in these essays, but in their different ways they are vital contributions to a much-needed national debate.

An informed and engaged public is a potential asset, not something to be frightened of, after all. Who knows, it may be possible to come up with some genuinely progressive, innovative ideas about what sort of domestic and international policies might be appropriate for an astonishingly fortunate country with no enemies.

Perhaps Australia could even offer an example of the sort of creative, independent middle power diplomacy a troubled world might appreciate and even emulate.

But given our political and strategic elites can’t free themselves from the past, it is difficult to see them dealing imaginatively with the threat of what Shortis calls the looming “environmental catastrophe”.

No wonder so many of the young despair and have little confidence in democracy’s ability to fix what ails us. More

After United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents arrested multiple people on alleged immigration violations, protests broke out in Los Angeles.

In response, police and military personnel have been deployed around the greater LA area.

Authorities have been using “less lethal” weapons against crowds of civilians, but these weapons can still cause serious harm.

Footage of an Australian news reporter being shot by a rubber bullet fired by police – who appeared to deliberately target her – has been beamed around the world. And headlines this morning told of an ABC camera operator hit in the chest with a “less lethal” round.

This has provoked debate about police and military use of force.

Read more:
In Trump’s America, the shooting of a journalist is not a one-off. Press freedom itself is under attack

What are ‘less lethal’ weapons?

As the term suggests, less lethal (also called non lethal or less-than-lethal) weapons are items that are less likely to result in death when compared with alternatives such as firearms.

Less lethal weapons include weapons such as:

pepper spray
tear gas
tasers
batons
water cannons
acoustic weapons
bean-bag rounds
rubber bullets.

They are designed and used to incapacitate people and disperse or control crowds.

They are meant to have temporary and reversible effects that minimise the likelihood of fatalities or permanent injury as well as undesired damage to property, facilities, material and the environment.

Fatalities can still occur but this does not necessarily mean the weapon itself caused those.

In Australia in 2023, for example, 95-year-old aged care resident Clare Nowland was tasered, fell backwards, hit her head and died from her head injury.

In 2012, responding to a mistaken report about an armed robbery, police physically restrained, tasered and pepper sprayed 21-year-old Roberto Curti multiple times. He died but his exact cause of death (and whether the use of less lethal weapons played a causal role) was not clear.

Do these weapons work to quell unrest?

The impetus for police and military use of less lethal force came about, in part, from backlash following the use of lethal force in situations where it was seen as a gross overreaction.

One example was the 1960 Sharpeville massacre in South Africa, when police officers in a black township opened fire on an anti-apartheid protest, killing 69 civilians.

In theory, less lethal force is meant to provide a graduated level of response to events such as riots or protests, where the use of lethal force would be disproportionate and counter-productive.

It is sometimes described as the “next step” to use after de-escalation techniques (like negotiation or verbal commands) have failed.

Less lethal weapons can be used when some degree of force is considered necessary to restore order, neutralise a threat, or avoid full-blown conflict.

How well this works in practice is a different story.

There can be unintended consequences and use of less lethal force can be seen as an act of aggression by a government against its people, heightening existing tensions.

The availability of less lethal weapons may also change perceptions of risk and encourage the use of force in situations where it would otherwise be avoided. This in turn can provoke further escalation, conflict and distrust of authorities. More

No travel can be considered completely safe. There are inherent risks from transportation, criminal activity, communicable diseases, injury and natural disasters.

Still, global travel is booming — for those who can afford it.

To reduce the chances of things going wrong, governments issue official travel advisories: public warnings meant to help people make informed travel decisions.

Sometimes these advisories seem puzzling – why, for example, does the US still have the “safest” rating despite the ongoing volatility in Los Angeles?

How do governments assess where is safe for Australians to travel?

A brief history of travel advisories

The United States pioneered travel advisories in 1978, with other countries such as Canada, the United Kingdom and Ireland following.

Australia started providing travel advisories in 1996 and now runs its system under the Smart Traveller platform.

To determine the risk level, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) draws on diplomatic reporting, assessments from Australian missions overseas about local security conditions, threat assessments from the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) and advice from Five Eyes intelligence sharing partners (Australia, the US, United Kingdom, New Zealand and Canada).

The goal is to create “smart, responsible informed travellers”, not to restrict tourism or damage foreign relationships.

DFAT has stressed its system is not influenced by “commercial or political considerations”.

Soft power and safety

In theory, these advisories are meant to inform travellers, keep them safe and reduce the burden on consular services.

However, they can also subtly reflect politics and alliances.

While travel advisories are presented as neutral, fact-based risk assessments, they may not always be free from political bias.

Research shows governments sometimes soften their warnings for countries they are close with and overstate risks in others.

A detailed analysis of US State Department travel warnings from 2009 to 2016 found only a weak correlation between the number of American deaths in a country and the warnings issued.

In some cases, destinations with no record of US fatalities received frequent warnings, while places with high death tolls had none.

In early 2024, Australia issued a string of warnings about rising safety concerns in the US and extremely strict entry conditions even with an appropriate visa.

Yet, the US kept its Level 1 rating – “exercise normal safety precautions” – the same advice given for places such as Japan or Denmark.

Meanwhile, Australia’s warning for France was Level 2 — “exercise a high degree of caution” — due to the potential threat of terrorism.

Experts have also criticised Australia’s travel warnings for being harsher toward developing countries.

The UK, a country with lower crime rates than the US, also sits at Level 2 — putting it in the same risk level as Saudi Arabia, Nicaragua and South Africa.

Read more:
In Trump’s America, the shooting of a journalist is not a one-off. Press freedom itself is under attack

Inconsistencies and grey areas

The problem is, the advisory levels themselves are vague: a Level 2 warning can apply to countries with very different risk profiles.

It’s used for places dealing with terrorism threats like France, or vastly different law and respect for human rights such as Saudi Arabia, or countries recovering from political unrest such as Sri Lanka.

Until early June 2025, Sweden was also rated Level 2 due to localised gang violence, despite relatively low risks for tourists. Its rating has since been revised down to Level 1.

Travel advisories often apply a blanket rating to an entire country, even when risks vary widely within its borders.

For instance, Australia’s Level 1 rating for the US doesn’t distinguish between different regional threats.

In June 2025, 15 people were injured in Boulder, Colorado after a man attacked a peaceful protest with Molotov cocktails.

Earlier in 2025, a major measles outbreak in West Texas resulted in more than 700 cases reported in a single county.

Despite this, Australia continues to classify the entire country as a low-risk destination.

This can make it harder for travellers to make informed, location-specific decisions.

Recent travel trends

Recent data indicate a significant downturn in international travel to the US: in March 2025, overseas visits to the US fell by 11.6% compared to the previous year, with notable declines from Germany (28%), Spain (25%) and the UK (18%).

Australian visitors to the US decreased by 7.8% compared to the same month in 2024, marking the steepest monthly drop since the COVID pandemic.

This trend suggests travellers are reassessing risk on their own even when official advisories don’t reflect those concerns.

The US case shows how politics can affect travel warnings: the country regularly experiences mass casualty incidents, violent protests and recently has been detaining and deporting people from many countries at the border including Australians, Germans and French nationals.

Yet it remains at Level 1.

What’s really going on has more to do with political alliances than safety: increasing the US travel risk level could create diplomatic friction.

What travellers can do now

If you’re a solo female traveller, identify as LGBTQIA+, are an academic, come from a visible minority or have spoken out online against the country you’re visiting, your experience might be very different from what the advice suggests.

So, here are some tips to stay safe while travelling:

Check multiple sources: don’t rely solely on travel advisories – compare travel advice from other countries
Get on-the-ground updates: check local news for coverage of events. If possible, talk to people who’ve recently visited for their experiences
For broader safety trends, tools like the Global Peace Index offer data on crime, political stability and healthcare quality. If you’re concerned about how locals or police treat certain groups, consult Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, or country-specific reports from Freedom House
Consider identity-specific resources: there are travel guides and safety indexes for LGBTQIA+ travellers like Equaldex, women travellers (Solo Female Travelers Network) and others. These may highlight risks general advisories miss.

Travel advisories often reflect whom your country trusts, not where you’re actually safe. If you’re relying on them, make sure you understand what they leave out. More

Former chairman Zia Yusuf has rejoined Reform after quitting days previously. Yusuf had said he no longer wanted to work to get the party into government when new MP Sarah Pochin called for a ban on burqas in the UK. However, he seems to have had a change of heart and will return, ostensibly to lead the party’s “department of government efficiency”.

Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s bromance, however, is on much rockier ground. There’s no sign of the world’s richest man reconciling with the US president, his former employer.

These spats, at first glance, might seem like little more than, put politely, teething problems in (relatively) new political operations. Or, a little less politely, the unedifying spectacle of people in or seeking power being completely unable to act like adults.

However, it also points to something more akin to a canary in the coalmine for radical right parties around the world. Their increasing reliance on an ultra-wealthy donor class presents an ideological puzzle that may not be solvable.

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Reform currently operates on what has been described as vibes alone. That is to say, there’s very little meaningful common ground between the people who vote for Reform and the party elite. The only continuity is their sense of anger at the current political system.

This, as we are seeing in election after election, is an incredibly powerful (and compelling) force. The problem is, of course, that you can’t oppose forever. You often end up having to actually do something. All boxers, Mike Tyson will be glad to tell you, have a plan – until they get punched in the face.

And what makes them such a powerful force at the moment, is precisely that which may cause challenges further down the line. At least for me, given it’s my bread and butter research-wise, I see this when I follow the money.

And I’m increasingly asked a lot of questions about the kind of people who are either giving money to Reform – or who Reform are courting (and at the moment it is decidedly the latter which is the case).

My position is that they very broadly fit into three categories. First are disaffected traditional Conservatives who are increasingly seeing a party – in the words of Farage – “worth investing in”. In the donations figures released on June 10, these are represented by bussinessmen Bassim Haidar and Mohammed Amersi.

Then you have a Silicon Valley-reared tech-bro libertarian. This group already runs on a “move fast and break things” philosophy so the idea of an insurgent party which proclaims, on entering parliament, that “the fox is in the henhouse” naturally appeals.

The final pot of money is filled via small donations, ballooning membership and a whole chunk of votes from a disaffected white working-class population to whom the language of economic and cultural grievances resonates.

There are some places where the interests of these groups align – most notably a distaste for government interference and red tape (though not necessarily a smaller state in terms spending on public services). They also share a sense that progressive politics, broadly defined, ought to be pegged back a bit (but with an emphasis on a bit).

They differ on a great deal else, to the extent that you can only really please two out of the three, but never everybody. And, unfortunately, without all three the project starts collapsing. This is what we have been seeing in the fractious relationships between Trump and Musk and Farage and Yusuf.

Two out of three ain’t bad – but it’s not enough

Yusuf (and Musk) are very much representative of the new tech-bro class. And, when Yusuf called questions about banning the burqa “dumb” he was speaking at both an ideological and organisational level.

At the ideological level it is, frankly, a bit rich for his blood, because “philosophically I am always a bit uneasy about banning things which, for example, would be unconstitutional in the United States”.

Organisationally, it pushes Reform much closer to what journalist Fraser Nelson calls “a tactic more akin to the old BNP”. Indeed, Reform started “just asking questions” about burqas at the same time as it started twisting footage to claim that Anas Sarwar, leader of Scottish Labour, wants to prioritise the needs of Pakistanis.

This kind of dog-whistle politics appeals to some, but puts off a lot more, including, I think, some of the (saner) tech-bro right.

Indeed, Ian Ward at Politico perceptively notes that if we want to explain the current Musk-Trump meltdown we should look back to Christmas 2024, when cracks first started appearing over immigration policy.

The tech-bro right are, generally speaking, much less hardline on the flow of people than the Maga-populist right (think Steve Bannon and Tommy Robinson). In fact, they are pro-high skilled immigration as it tends to benefit them and their business interests.

Tech-bros also like the idea of moving fast and breaking things in theory. But when things start moving fast and actually breaking in practice (or Tesla stocks start to plummet), they tend to get a bit freaked out.

In other words, it’s not just that they don’t like government, they don’t like governing and the inevitable compromise that comes with it. When they say move fast and break things, I get the sense what they really mean is “leave me alone so I can make billions in peace”.

Musk and Trump have been exchanging barbed social media posts since the former left the White House.
EPA/Francis Chung

This, of course, is quite appealing to traditional hedge-fund conservatives, but is also the politics that literally built the economic grievances that much of the white-working class support for the populist radical right is, in turn, built on.

Two out of three ain’t bad, but you do need all three. So, don’t be surprised if despite Farage’s seemingly genuine affection for Yusuf, it all falls apart again before long.

Ultimately, Reform will need to decide how they are going to spin these plates. The good news is that it might well be that they can, indeed, get by on vibes alone until the next general election. The bad news, unfortunately, is that winning an election is the easy bit. Just ask Boris Johnson and Keir Starmer. After all, everyone has a plan. More