General U.S. NewsJul 3, 2026·3 min read

One Nation is campaigning directly to Christians. But will party policies rub against worshippers’ conscience?

The Guardian – World

1h ago

One Nation is campaigning directly to Christians. But will party policies rub against worshippers’ conscience?

Summary

Anti-abortion policies may have appeal, but with one in three Australian churchgoers born overseas, talk of a monoculture may put them off Get our breaking news email , free app or daily news podcast When One Nation recruit Barnaby Joyce addressed anti-abortion campaigners at a Sydney rally in early June, the former deputy prime minister told the audience he could see “about 1,500 people who can hand out how to vote cards”. While voting patterns of churchgoers historically favour the Coalition, Christians are known to abruptly shift their vote based on wide-ranging policy issues affecting everything from abortion, marriage and religious schools to social services, immigration, climate and refugees. Kevin Rudd drew many conservative voters to Labor in 2007 by being a practising Christian who argued that a faithful ethos must care for the marginalised. She has warned against a “growing language problem which is a function of immigration”. Hanson is recording far higher net approval ratings than the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, or the opposition leader, Angus Taylor, with her party now drawing aspirational supporters away from the Coalition and Labor. Among Christians, One Nation threatens to take the Coalition’s evangelicals and Labor’s traditional working-class Catholics. John Black, a former Labor senator and founder of demographic profiling company Australian Development Strategies, says if Australia does have a Bible belt, it is located on the suburban peripheries of major cities, which are densely populated areas often in marginal seats. The party’s platform also includes a policy of refusing entry to migrants from nations known to foster ideas that are “incompatible with Australian values”. Hanson has questioned the existence of “good Muslims”; a remark she was censured for in the Senate. Hanson concentrated her address at the National Press Club last month on attributing the housing crisis to demand caused by immigration, without noting the contribution of decades of chronic undersupply and investor-centric tax settings.

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Pope praises US history of welcoming immigrants in implicit rebuke to Trump

Pope Leo urges Americans to live up to the ideals of the Declaration of Independence in his first major address to the US Pope Leo has used his first major address to his home country to praise the US history of ⁠welcoming migrants, urging Americans to live up to the ideals put forward in the ⁠Declaration of Independence. In his latest implicit rebuke to Donald Trump, the first US leader of the Roman Catholic church said the word “America” had become ‌a “byword for freedom” across the world because of the way the country welcomed migrants. In a speech given live from the Vatican to the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia ‌as he received the Center’s Liberty Medal, Leo said he hoped that ideals of “unity, justice and peace” held by the founding fathers would guide the US as it celebrated its 250th anniversary. “This historic anniversary presents ⁠us with the opportunity to reflect once again on the nation’s founding principles in the hope that America will remain ever true ‌to the dream that has earned it the title of land of the free and home of the brave,” the pope said. Leo will mark the US’s 250th anniversary on Saturday with a brief visit to the southern Italian island of Lampedusa, one of the main entry points to Europe for people making the perilous sea crossing from north Africa in search of refuge. Leo will arrive in Lampedusa by helicopter early on Saturday morning and make his first stop at a cemetery where there are many unmarked graves of people who died during the Mediterranean journey. He will then visit the Porta d’Europa (Gateway to Europe), a migrant memorial monument, before blessing a plaque on a pier named after his late predecessor, Pope Francis, who denounced the “globalisation of indifference” when he visited the island in July 2013 on his first official papal trip. Like Francis, Leo has clashed with Trump over his immigration policies, calling in November for “deep reflection” in the US about the treatment of people held in detention. Days before Leo’s trip to Lampedusa, JD Vance, the US vice-president, said the Vatican’s views on immigration were “troubling”. He is focusing on the theme of immigration. This means reaffirming what he recently said in Spain about the dignity of every human being, but the trip is also a political message against the persecution of immigrants and what is being done by ICE (immigration enforcement agency) agents in the US. “Furthermore, it is a strong political message against all the parties in Europe who sow hatred and polarise.” Andrea Vreede, the Vatican correspondent for the Dutch broadcaster NOS, said Leo’s trip was partly to pay homage to Francis but also to make a point to Trump. “The pope is telling Trump what is important to him, and that is migrants.

Charanjit Channi emerges as top choice for Punjab Congress chief amid power tussle

Former Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi emerged as the most popular choice for the post of Punjab Congress president during consultations conducted by a three-member observers' panel, according to Congress sources, even as a fresh power tussle has erupted within the state unit over the party leadership. The development assumes significance as more than 20 sitting and former Congress MLAs, along with several senior leaders, rallied behind Channi on Friday after the party leadership decided to retain Amrinder Singh Raja Warring as the Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) chief. The observers held extensive consultations with nearly 67 leaders, including Congress Working Committee members, former ministers, MLAs, MPs and District Congress Committee presidents. According to a source, an overwhelming majority of leaders backed Channi for the post of Punjab Congress president. A senior source familiar with the consultation process told India Today that Channi enjoys considerable popularity and, when compared with other Congress leaders in the state, remains by far the most popular leader. In a post on X, Channi shared a video of Congress leader Tript Rajinder Singh Bajwa speaking to the media and wrote that Congress leaders had called on him at his residence and urged him to present the sentiments and aspirations of the people of Punjab before the party high command. Reports also suggest Channi is unhappy about being overlooked for the post of state Congress chief. Ahead of the 2022 Punjab Assembly elections, the Congress had replaced former Chief Minister Amarinder Singh with Channi. In the latest organisational reshuffle, the Congress retained Partap Singh Bajwa as the Leader of Opposition in the Punjab Assembly. Randhawa, who was also considered a contender for the state Congress chief's post, was appointed chairperson of the party's core committee as the Congress attempted to accommodate multiple leaders in different organisational committees ahead of the Assembly elections.

I used to revere the great experiment that is the United States. After Trump, I’m not so sure | Jonathan Freedland

On paper, the US constitution is a thing of beauty. But the would-be emperor in Washington has revealed its great weakness A merica’s big birthday has come at a bad time. On Saturday it will be a divided nation that marks 250 years since 13 North American colonies declared their independence from the Great Britain of George III. Many will be anxious that the republic they established that day is fragile – not least because of the would-be emperor in the White House. Some will console themselves that hope and angst have always been intertwined in the American story. From the very start, confidence in a bright, exceptional US future was combined with foreboding and doubt. That yes, a crude, venal braggart is in the Oval Office – one who, we learned this week, personally pocketed $2.2bn in his first year back in office ; and yes, he launched a disastrous war that has made one of America’s sworn enemies, Iran, stronger and the US weaker; and yes, he has set about dismantling a post-1945 rules-based international order from which the US only ever benefited, growing stronger and richer; and yes, he and his vice-president seem determined to replace their country’s animating “creedal” conception of national identity, in which citizenship is open to whoever subscribes to America’s core ideals, with a definition that instead demands blood-and-soil ethnic heritage – but all of that will pass. The founders erected several barriers to such a person, whether emoluments clauses, to guard against the receipt of foreign gifts and the pursuit of earnings outside the job of serving the people as president, or an elaborate series of checks and balances to ensure powers were separated rather than concentrated in a single pair of hands. In this second term, Congress has watched as the president gathers more and more power to himself, stealing it from them, and they have not stirred. Meanwhile, the judges of the supreme court, whom the framers envisaged as the protectors of the constitution, have played their own part in enabling the Trump power grab.

One Nation is campaigning directly to Christians. But will party policies rub against worshippers’ conscience?

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Pope praises US history of welcoming immigrants in implicit rebuke to Trump

Charanjit Channi emerges as top choice for Punjab Congress chief amid power tussle

I used to revere the great experiment that is the United States. After Trump, I’m not so sure | Jonathan Freedland