Politics with Michelle Grattan

The Conversation's Chief Political Correspondent Michelle Grattan talks politics with politicians and experts, from Capital Hill.

  1. The Making of an Autocrat: suppress the people

    JAN 4

    The Making of an Autocrat: suppress the people

    The list of people Donald Trump has punished or threatened to punish since returning to office is long. It includes the likes of James Comey, Letitia James, John Bolton, as well as members of the opposition, such as Adam Schiff, Mark Kelly and Kamala Harris. In fact, he has gone so far as to call Democrats “the enemy from within”, saying they are more dangerous than US adversaries like Russia and China. According to Lucan Way, a professor of democracy at the University of Toronto, when a leader attacks the opposition like this, it’s a clear sign a country is slipping into authoritarianism. As Way says in episode 5 of The Making of an Autocrat: "In other kind of countries with weaker justice systems, you can literally jail members of opposition or bankrupt them. In a country like the United States, where the rule of law is quite robust, this is not possible, you can’t just jail rivals at will." But Trump has other ways of making the cost of opposing him too high for his critics to bear. This includes investigations, lawsuits, audits, personal attacks – anything to distract and silence them. The effect is his opponents become much more reluctant to engage in behaviour they know that Trump won’t like, Way says: "So it really has this kind of broader silencing effect that I think is quite pernicious." This episode was written by Justin Bergman and produced and edited by Isabella Podwinski and Ashlynne McGhee. Sound design by Michelle Macklem. Mentioned in this episode: Your support matters Support non-profit journalism you can trust. Donations 2025

    16 min
  2. The Making of an Autocrat: recruit an architect

    12/28/2025

    The Making of an Autocrat: recruit an architect

    Every autocrat needs a clan of loyalists, strategists, masterminds – these are the figures behind the scenes pulling the strings. They’re unelected and unaccountable, yet they wield a huge amount of power. This is the role Stephen Miller has played for Donald Trump – he is the architect in chief for the second Trump administration. He has so much power, in fact, he’s reportedly referred to as the "prime minister." So who is Stephen Miller? And why are architects so important in helping a would-be autocrat amass power? As Emma Shortis, a Trump expert and an adjunct senior fellow at RMIT University in Melbourne, explains in episode 2 of The Making of an Autocrat: "[Miller] is the kind of brains behind particularly Trump's hardline stances on immigration and the Trump administration's ability to use the levers of power, and expand the power available to the president. I think what Stephen Miller demonstrates and, and history has demonstrated over and over again is that autocrats cannot rise to power by themselves. They often require a singular kind of charisma and a singular kind of historical moment, but they also need architects behind them who are able to facilitate their rise to power." This episode was written by Justin Bergman and produced and edited by Isabella Podwinski and Ashlynne McGhee. Sound design by Michelle Macklem. Mentioned in this episode: Your support matters Support non-profit journalism you can trust. Donations 2025

    17 min

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The Conversation's Chief Political Correspondent Michelle Grattan talks politics with politicians and experts, from Capital Hill.

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