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DANIEL:

From Schwartz Media. I’m Daniel James, this is 7am.

Alex Antic doesn’t want to lead the Liberal Party. He wants to reshape it, and he’s already making headway. Senator Antic calls himself an irrelevant backbencher: but he’s installed allies, toppled moderates, and pushed the party’s politics to the edge. His playbook mirrors Donald Trump’s: dominate the narrative, fight the culture wars, and never aim for the centre.

Now, he’s turning disruption into power; and moderates fear the party is becoming unelectable.

Today, special correspondent for The Saturday Paper, Jason Koutsoukis, on the rise of Alex Antic and the fight for the soul of the Liberal Party.

It’s Monday, June 23.

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DANIEL:

Jason, a single photo of Liberal backbencher Alex Antic posing with Donald Trump really set things off last week. Tell me about that post.

JASON:

So Daniel, as we all know, Anthony Albanese has been trying to get a meeting with the U.S. President Donald Trump. He thought he had one at the G7 summit in Canada until Donald Trump suddenly changed the script and said he was going back to Washington early, effectively standing the Prime Minister up. And Alex Antic, the senator from South Australia, the liberal power broker in that state. He was quick to post this picture that he had of himself standing next to Donald Trump with a caption, bad luck at Elbow MP. He doesn't meet with everyone. This is really very much his style. Alex Antic is of course number one on the Liberal Senate ticket in South Australia. He comes from the hard right of the Liberal Party and he's been able to effectively take control of the Liberal Party machinery in South Australia and he is the most powerful politician in the Liberal Party in South-Australia. He's someone that does instil a bit of fear in that moderate wing of the Liberal party.

DANIEL:

So is that why the photo itself stirred such a big reaction within the party?

JASON:

I think Donald Trump did so much damage to the liberal brand during the election campaign that we've all just been through, that to see a liberal come out and lean into that in such a public way did cause quite a bit of groaning inside the parliamentary liberal party because I guess what most people are thinking is how are we ever going to get back into government if we have people like Alex Antic posting photos of themselves with Donald Trump and and really trying to emulate Donald Trump in the way they do politics here.

Audio excerpt – Speaker 1:

“The welcome to country is nothing more. Than something wealthy city people love to do to make themselves feel good.”

Audio excerpt – Speaker 1:

“What does it say about this country, when we commemorate Anzac Day for a single day, yet we get a whole month of pride.”

Audio excerpt – Speaker 1:

“Young men are entitled to feel let down by the manner in which they're treated in modern Australia. Let down by the housing market, let down the job markets, and let down a society that continues to call them toxic.”

DANIEL:

So he's just a backbencher, so how much power does he actually hold within the broader party?

JASON:

Well, within the broader party, many of his colleagues would argue not much.

And while he may not be on the front bench, he does have regular guest appearances on Sky News.

Audio excerpt – Speaker 1:

“Alex uh... You've heard what i have to say tell me what you think about the loss and i'm out he was outside of the u.s. Will not forgive me if i do not say you should be the next leader of the liberal party so there are said it.”

JASON:

So you often see him on Peta Credlin's programme, or Rowan Dean's programme or Rita Panahi's programme.

Audio excerpt – Speaker 2:

“The tragedy this is that people never really, I don't think, saw the very kind, very... Quick-witted and mischievously humoured Peter Dutton out of all of this.”

Audio excerpt – Speaker 2:

“This push on the doge, but also out of countries like Argentina that were doing this two years ago under Javier Melei are now showing that there's an appetite for lean main government.”

JASON:

And I think he does have, through that, quite a bit of influence on the parliamentary Liberal Party. And if he wants to kick up a big stink on an issue, then he's probably going to be able to bring a group of people with him.

Alex Antic rose to kind of national consciousness in March last year when he succeeded in demoting the Liberals number one. Senate ticket holder Anne Ruston. Anne Rusten is a nationally recognised figure. She's a former cabinet minister in the Morrison government and she's also prominent moderate in the Liberal Party and I think that really upset a lot of Liberals because there wasn't really any point to it. It was just a way to demonstrate his power to flex his muscles and ultimately that means He's a problem that the liberal leadership will have to deal with.

DANIEL:

For this story Jason, did you reach out to Senator Antic for comment?

JASON:

I did email him, I actually emailed his media advisor, whose name I was told was Matthew, they wouldn't give me his family name, they gave me an email address and it was Alex Antic that replied to that email. And he was quite irreverent, was probably the tone that characterised Alex Antic's reply to me. He said, Dear Jason, happy to go with the following. And then in inverted commas. I am always amused by approaches from journalists looking to write a profile piece, but I can see why your outlet is so interested in writing about me. So, you know, heavy tone of sarcasm there. And he goes on, one wonders how you will take my advocacy for small government, individual rights and family values. Surely you wouldn't just roll out many of the commonly used phrases as adopted by the left-wing media, such as far right or hard right, and then he finishes off with a brush off but also a bit of a wink here. If you can forward me a link I will read it when I find a moment.

DANIEL:

So he was just trying to portray himself as a humble backbencher from South Australia.

JASON:

That's right.

It's interesting that he seems to object to these kinds of descriptions, far right and hard right. But I don't know that there's any other way to describe Alex Antic, because the positions he takes are on the hard right of Australian politics. They're certainly not where most voters are. And as we know from Susan Lee, the new leader of the Federal Liberal Party, that's what she sees as being her mission, is to meet voters where they are. And I think she's going to have a huge fight on her hands in trying to take Alex on and undermine the influence that he has on the parliamentary liberal party and ultimately on voters out there in the electorate.

DANIEL:

After the break - Alex Antic wants the party to focus on abortions, gender dysphoria, and killing net zero.

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DANIEL:

Jason, let's drill down on Alex Handick's ideology a little bit more. Can you give me a rundown of his politics and the direction he wants to take the Liberal Party in?

JASON:

I think that the one issue that encapsulates this question best is net zero. This is Australia's commitment for net zero greenhouse emissions by 2050. And Alex Antic sees net zero as a line in the sand.

Audio excerpt – Speaker 2:

“Putting Australia first has got to mean dumping net zero, and I hope we do come to that position, and I hop we come to it quickly as a party.”

JASON:

He's not going to sit quietly on the sidelines and allow the Liberal Party to recommit off to net zero. And earlier this month at a State Council meeting of the South Australian Liberal Party, a meeting that was dominated by conservatives who are aligned with Alex Antic, the South Australia Liberal Party formally voted to reject Net Zero.

Audio excerpt – Speaker 2:

“Alex, you were the driving force behind the South Australian Liberal Party's recent decision to abandon Net Zero by 2050, and you called on the federal Libs to also walk away from Net Zero, but just hours later, the South Australian Liberal leader poured cold water on the move, telling reporters that none these policy discussions bind any of the parliamentary wings of the party Tell my audience what's going on. Are the South Australian Libs walking away from Net Zero or are you sort of still half pregnant?”

Audio excerpt – Speaker 2:

“Well, look, Rita.”

JASON:

The result of that is that you've got the party now trying to straddle three contradictory positions. Susan Lee's federal wing has Net Zero under review. You've got South Australian parliamentary liberals who support net zero but you've got now got the state division that formally opposes net zero and i think this is an outcome that's not just confusing it's incendiary and and you've now got senior liberals in south australia fearing when they have to fight the next state election in south Australia next march that they might go even lower than the the 13 seats they have in the legislative assembly, that they might even go backwards.

Audio excerpt – Speaker 2:

“Here in South Australia, we have been restocking the shelves at membership level with people that share our values, true Liberals. They have been pre-selecting people who have been making their way to Parliament to the extent that they can.”

DANIEL:

You've been speaking to moderates within the party. What have they been telling you about him and their concerns about Antic?

JASON:

Well, one liberal I spoke to described him as a very dangerous man. This person added that Alex Antic would make a fascinating case study in psychological analysis because they don't think the average liberal has any idea what Alex Antic's end game is. Is he trying to destroy the party and rebuild it in the image of the Republican Party in the US? Does he actually want to be Australia's Donald Trump? This person doesn't actually know the answer to that question but thinks it's very strange nonetheless. Another liberal I spoke to described Alex Antic as the most cold-hearted vindictive person they had ever encountered in politics. Another person I spoke to said to me that you turn up to a Liberal Party meeting in South Australia these days and you get yelled at about late-term abortions or gender dysphoria or puberty blockers. Or things that normal liberals are not really interested in. They find that the party they love is now more interested in hysterically pursuing these ideological crusades, things they don't want to have anything to do with and that mainstream voters want nothing to do it. And these members are leaving the party because they will not be dictated to by Alex Antic and his supporters, who, this person added, are probably more suited to Pauline Hanson's One Nation.

DANIEL:

So do you think that Senator Antic and the playbook that he's using, the one that is largely adopted from Trumpian politics, is ultimately harming the Liberal Party?

JASON:

I do think so, Daniel, because as Susan Lee said, I think in her first press conference as leader, the Liberal Party has to meet voters where they are, and voters are not where Alex Antic is. So if he can continue to influence the debate in the way that he's trying to, pulling the party further to the right, then I don't think the Liberal Party has any hope of winning back government. They've got to move back towards the the centre, they've got to get back to those issues that are its traditional strengths, particularly on the economy that the Liberal Party has always stood for, but they have to start talking about those issues in a serious way, not become obsessed by these culture war issues.

So he has a degree of power within the party and he seems to be hell bent on not taking any sort of advice out of the lessons of the last election in terms of moving closer to the centre. Despite that, do you think he has a chance of succeeding with some of his ideological crusades?

JASON:

He's not on his own when it comes to net zero. We saw, in a Four Corners episode straight after the federal election, that disastrous May 3 election for the Liberal Party, we saw Andrew Hastie, perhaps a future leader of the Liberal party, say that he was wanting to get out of the net zero straight jacket.

Audio excerpt – Speaker 2:

“The question of net zero, again, that's a straightjacket that I'm already getting out of. The real question is, should Australian families and businesses be paying more for their electricity?”

JASON:

Which surprised me, coming from such a clearly intelligent, sensible person as Andrew Hastie. For him to say that. Was a signal, I think, that there are large sections of the parliamentary Liberal Party that are unhappy with Net Zero as a policy position. So I think there's quite a bit of debate left in this fight. But I also think it's a pointless battle because the Liberal Party cannot afford to give up Net Zero and hope to be a party of the centre. Because most voters do accept that climate change is real, they do accept the Australian Government has to do something about it and that we've got to move towards net zero greenhouse gas emissions.

DANIEL:

Jason, it's been a pleasure talking with you and a pleasure working with you.

JASON:

An absolute pleasure talking with you and I hope we continue to talk into the future.

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DANIEL:

Also in the news today…

The United States has bombed three nuclear sites in Iran.

US president Donald Trump confirmed the attacks via Truth social - calling them quote “very successful”.

Trump said all American warplanes were now outside Iranian airspace. The bombings come after a week of uncertainty about whether the United States would directly intervene in the escalating conflict between Israel and Iran.

And

Greens leader Larissa Waters says Australia cannot allow itself to be dragged into another war in the Middle East.

Calling America's strikes on Iran, a “blatant breach of international war”, senator Waters said the Australian government should take this opportunity to withdraw from the AUKUS agreement and condemn America's actions.

I'm Daniel James. This is 7am. Thanks for listening.

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