Freddy Gray

Freddy Gray

Freddy Gray is deputy editor of The Spectator

Most-read 2021: Battle royal – Harry and Meghan’s modern brand of revenge

From our UK edition

We’re ending the year by republishing our ten most popular articles from 2021. Here’s number seven: Freddy Gray writing in March about Harry and Meghan’s revenge against the Firm.  Remember the Heads Together campaign? It was back in 2017. Prince William, his wife Kate and his brother Prince Harry, who’d recently begun dating a conspicuously woke actress

Year in Review – 2021

From our UK edition

42 min listen

Douglas Murray joins Freddy Gray for a look back at yet another tumultuous year in American politics. They discuss the irreconcilable divide between left and right, the origins of Covid-19, the war in Afghanistan, the fallout from the 2020 election and much more, including the temptations of a bottle of Glenmorangie whiskey.

Christmas Special

From our UK edition

90 min listen

Welcome to the special Christmas episode of The Edition! In this episode, we look at five major topics that dominated the news this year and the pages of The Spectator. First up a review of the year in politics with our resident Coffee House Shots’ team James Forsyth, Katy Balls and Isabel Hardman. We discuss

There’s nothing outrageous about Johnson’s Christmas quiz

From our UK edition

Since lockdown, the Mirror has had a good line on Tory lockdown hypocrisy scandals: Barnard Castle and the No. 10 parties. But today’s Sunday Mirror splash does not really deserve to go down in the annals of historic journalistic scoops — despite all the excited chatter this morning. Like all ‘clear breach of lockdown rules’,

Ian Maxwell on the treatment of Ghislaine

From our UK edition

24 min listen

The trial of Ghislaine Maxwell has gripped the world, a woman accused of truly horrendous crimes. But have we as a society thrown out the cardinal rule of innocent until proven guilty? Freddy Gray sits down with her brother Ian Maxwell who believes that her treatment pre-trial has been nothing short of torturous.

Jussie Smollett and the rise of American hate hoaxing

From our UK edition

The actor Jussie Smollett has been jailed for 150 days after staging a hate crime against himself. Freddy Gray wrote about the rise of hate hoaxing in December… So Jussie Smollett, the world’s most notorious hate hoaxer, has at last been found guilty of lying to the police.  Smollett, you may remember, was the actor

The phoney war on Allegra Stratton

From our UK edition

There’s something telling about the alacrity with which the SW1 hive mind has seized on the leaked clip of Allegra Stratton. For our slightly depraved opinion-forming class, the sight of the Prime Minister’s press spokesperson sniggering about a party that apparently happened in No. 10 at a time when the government had ordered us all

Hospital pass: The NHS is on life support

From our UK edition

41 min listen

In this week’s episode: Is the current NHS crisis a bug or a feature? In the Spectator’s cover story this week, our economics editor Kate Andrews writes about the state of the NHS and why even though reform is so clearly needed it’s nearly politically impossible to try to do so. She joins the podcast

‘Immigration is war’: an interview with Éric Zemmour

From our UK edition

Éric Zemmour looks down at a copy of The Spectator and cocks his eyebrows at the unflattering cartoon of him on the cover. He decides he doesn’t care. ‘It takes a lot to offend me, you know,’ he says. He then leafs through the magazine making polite and appreciative noises. ‘Ah, Doooglas Murray!’ he exclaims.

Toil and trouble: Europe faces a new form of warfare

From our UK edition

37 min listen

In this week’s episode: Are migrants the new munitions? In our cover story this week, our political editor James Forsyth looks at the growing troubles in Eastern Europe and how this small part of the world stage could end up splintering the scaffolding of global peace. He is joined on the podcast by Mary Dejevsky,

The Palace vs the Sussexes

From our UK edition

What will become of the British monarchy after Elizabeth II? It’s a question that many would prefer not to ask. But the Queen is 95, her husband died earlier this year and she’s pulling out of engagements she’s rarely missed in 69 years on the throne. More honest royal sources confirm the obvious: she’s had

What’s the truth about Kyle Rittenhouse?

From our UK edition

On the night of 25 August 2020, Richie McGinniss, a somewhat gonzo video journalist, interviewed Kyle Rittenhouse for the right-wing Daily Caller website. Rittenhouse wore his cap backwards, had rubbery purple medical gloves on and an assault rifle dangling between his legs. He had decided for some reason that he, a 17-year-old boy, had to

Has fame eaten America alive?

From our UK edition

22 min listen

Freddy Gray talks to Michael Wolff about his latest book ‘Too Famous’, and looks back at how the quest for fame has affected politics over the last two decades.

Superbad: Joe Biden’s plummeting presidency

From our UK edition

41 min listen

In this week’s episode: Has the Biden Presidency stalled or crashed? In our cover story this week, Freddy Gray assesses the state of the Biden presidency. With steadily lowering approval ratings, a disastrous Afghanistan withdrawal, and this week’s failure of the Democrats to hold on to the Virginia Governorship, how much trouble is the US’s

Superbad: Joe Biden’s plummeting presidency

From our UK edition

Who can blame President Biden for nodding off at the COP26 summit on Monday? It was an astronomically boring session — opening statement after opening statement, pompous speaker after pompous speaker, insisting that the time for words on climate change is over. Now is the time for… zzzzzzzzzzzz. It’s a miracle the jet-lagged, 78-year-old leader