Freddy Gray

Freddy Gray

Freddy Gray is deputy editor of The Spectator and the editor of the US edition. He hosts Americano on YouTube.

Will America eventually tire of Trump’s legal troubles?

In our age of mass attention deficit, the manifold legals trials against Donald Trump represent a big challenge. Maybe that’s the point. It’s hard to care when you can’t keep count. The whole objective of ‘lawfare’, as it is called, is to bully your enemy into submission through overwhelming paperwork. It might work. That doesn’t make it just.  Let’s be clear: calling the multi-dimensional legal campaign against Donald Trump ‘lawfare’ isn’t a statement of support for Trump, necessarily. It’s more a summary of observable reality.  The irony is that, at this stage in the presidential campaign, the legal warfare on Trump is increasing his appeal The latest of four criminal cases against the 45th president of the United States comes from Georgia.

Why are Democrats winning on abortion?

39 min listen

Freddy Gray speaks to Inez Stepman, a Lincoln Fellow at the Claremont Institute who was last on Americano to discuss the overturning of Roe vs Wade last year. As seen in the November midterms, could this be a winning issue for the Democrats who are gearing up for the general election?

UFOs – is the truth out there?

18 min listen

The US government is apparently hiding a programme to capture and reverse-engineer UFOs. At a congressional hearing last week, David Grusch, a former intelligence official who worked with a Pentagon team looking into UFOs, said 'non-human' objects had been recovered by the government. Are they finding aliens, or Chinese and Russian drones? What's behind the American obsession with extraterrestrials? And is the government making up sightings to justify higher defence spending? Freddy Gray is joined by Spectator contributor Sean Thomas.

Why has Trump been indicted…again?

19 min listen

Freddy Gray sits down with Jacob Heilbrunn to discuss Donald Trump’s latest indictment over January 6th. The former President faces 78 charges which, if found guilty, could mean he will spend several years in prison.

America’s sub-literate generation

30 min listen

Only 72% of Americans can read to 6th grade level. Freddy is joined by Peter Wood to talk about how this has happened, and why it is getting worse. What political and cultural factors have diminished the importance of reading and writing in education, and with students already using AI, where does America go from here?

Freddy Gray, Mary Wakefield, Gareth Roberts and Rachel Johnson

28 min listen

This week (01.13) Freddy Gray, on why Ron De Santis is no longer ‘de future’ in the race for the Presidency, (09.50) Mary Wakefield recounts the train journey from hell,(16.10) we hear from Gareth Roberts about the screenwriters and actors striking over AI potentially taking their jobs and (22.24) Rachel Johnson shares her diary of SAS adventures and mishaps in New Zealand.

What’s gone wrong for Ron DeSantis?

It’s widely acknowledged that, as governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis has been a success. As a presidential candidate, however, he has been a disaster – at least, so far. Last weekend, amid reports that his bid for the White House was floundering, DeSantis sacked a dozen of his staff and scaled back his travel plans. He may have raised some $20 million between April and June, but some of the biggest Republican donors, who flocked towards him at the end of last year, are starting to turn away. His campaign is now concerned about funds running out. ‘The question comes down to: do you want boring Trump? And the answer is no’ DeSantis disputes the ‘doom and gloom’ characterisations of his candidacy.

What went wrong for Ron DeSantis?

30 min listen

Freddy is joined this week by Roger Kimball, editor of the New Criterion to talk about the diminishing power of Ron DeSantis. It wasn't so long ago he looked like a serious challenger that could beat Donald Trump to the Republican nomination. Where did it all go wrong?

Is Britain a bad example for American conservatives?

33 min listen

On his current visit to the UK, Spectator World columnist and Modern Age editor Daniel McCarthy sat down with Freddy to discuss what lessons American Republicans should learn from the doldrums into which the Tory party has steered itself. Produced by Natasha Feroze and Saby Kulkarni.

Are Biden and Sunak really ‘rock solid’?

10 min listen

Joe Biden was in London today to meet with Rishi Sunak. The pair had discussions in No. 10, and Biden described US-UK relations as ‘rock solid’. But the pair have recently had disagreements about who the next Nato secretary general should be, and about whether the West should send cluster munitions to Ukraine – so is the relationship really so rosy? James Heale speaks to Katy Balls and Freddy Gray. Produced by Max Jeffery.

Joe Biden is not OK

25 min listen

Freddy Gray speaks to Spectator columnist, Douglas Murray who wrote in the magazine this week about Joe Biden's endless gaffes and the incompetence which Douglas argues has spilled into the rest of the party. Produced by Natasha Feroze.

Will Hunter bring down Joe Biden?

39 min listen

This week Freddy is joined by Jacob Heilbrunn, editor of the National Interest, and Charles Lipson, professor of political science at the University of Chicago. They discuss Charles's recent piece in The Spectator's US edition where he argues that the walls are closing in on old Joe, in relation to the Hunter Biden story. Is the President's involvement in his son's dealings really just 'malarkey'?

Joe Biden’s Hunter problem will not go away

Shall we play a game of pick the real criminal? Come on, it will be fun. On the one hand, we have a 77-year-old man, a former president and a billionaire, whose Gollum-like greed caused him to hoard various boxes of classified documents which he should have returned to the proper authorities. He, or his associates, also fudged various business records possibly to cover up ‘hush money’ payments he made to a porn star. Oh, and he had a massive tantrum about losing an election, tried to overturn the result, and his shenanigans caused some of his supporters to breach the Capitol building in Washington on 6 January, 2021.

Is it the end of Silicon Valley?

39 min listen

Freddy Gray speaks to Joel Kotkin who is the author of The Coming of Neo-Feudalism: A Warning to the Global Middle Class. On the podcast, they discuss the collapse of Silicon Valley. With mass layoffs in the tech sector and a post-pandemic real estate downturn, Kotkin argues the Valley is entering a period of long-term decline – but can it come back from this? Produced by Natasha Feroze.

Will nuclear power heal the climate?

52 min listen

This week, Freddy is joined by a great American filmmaker, Oliver Stone, and a great Argentinian filmmaker, Fernando Sulichin. Their new documentary Nuclear Now proposes nuclear energy as the solution to the climate crisis. On the podcast, they address global concerns about adding nuclear to the energy mix, compare the nuclear policy of Presidents Biden and Trump and discuss the opinion that Oliver formed of Vladimir Putin while filming The Putin Interviews.

What happened to Kim Darroch?

34 min listen

Freddy Gray is joined by Steve Edginton, video comment editor at the Telegraph and host of the Off Script podcast to discuss curious case of Sir Kim Darroch. A former civil servant has accused the government of an attempt to cover up “crimes” by the former British ambassador to the US, who he claims leaked intelligence to his lover. What has this done to the Anglo-American relations on the week Rishi Sunak visited Washington?

America is trapped in Trump legal groundhog day

Insanity, they say, is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. If that’s true, then what the American justice system is doing to Donald Trump is barking mad.  Yes, he’s been indicted, again – on seven federal criminal charges. It’s all unprecedented, again – he’s the first president ever to face, blah, blah, blah. We’re all familiar with the ‘Trump facing…’ news loop by now. America is stuck in Trump legal groundhog day — he’s remorselessly prosecuted, over and over, on so many fronts. He always responds the same way, protesting his INNOCENCE in capital letters on Truth Social, saying he can’t believe this is happening in America. Then his team fires out fund-raising emails. Last time it was the civil rape case in New York.

Harry’s crusade: the Prince vs the press

31 min listen

This week:  Prince Harry has taken the stand to give evidence in the Mirror Group phone hacking trial which The Spectator’s deputy editor Freddy Gray talks about in his cover piece for the magazine. He is joined by Patrick Jephson, former private secretary to Princess Diana, to discuss whether Harry's 'suicide mission' against the press is ill-advised. (01:22) Also this week:  In The Spectator professor Robert Tombs details the trouble with returning the Benin Bronzes back to Nigeria, arguing that their restitution is more complicated than some claim.

Harry’s crusade: the Prince vs the press

Self-pity is one hell of a drug. On Tuesday, a day late, Prince Harry appeared in the High Court to ‘give evidence’ against the Mirror. The only testimony he was willing to provide, however, was his familiar gloop about the pain he suffered growing up rich, famous and royal. He can’t help himself, poor boy, and we should probably stop indulging him. We won’t, though. In a 49-page witness statement, the Duke of Sussex tried once again to make peace with himself by blaming the press for everything. ‘You start off as a blank canvas while they work out what kind of a person you are and what kind of problems and temptations you might have,’ he declared.