Michael, I couldnt help but notice the reporter grilling president Donald Trump in the White House this week had a peculiar accent. Is he one of yours?

Hi Matthew! Very perceptive of you. The Axios reporter with the furrowed brow and comically perplexed expression is Jonathan Swan, a former Sydney Morning Herald journalist. After making his name as a political reporter here in Australia, Swan moved to the US in 2014 to work as a Congressional aide as part of an academic fellowship. Since then hes worked as a reporter at the Hill before moving to Axios in 2016. Since the Trump interview he has become a hugely popular meme thanks to his quizzical response to the presidents insistence the US was doing better than any other country in tackling Covid-19.

So hes sort of adopted the US as his home country. Has he ever been involved in any particularly Australian stories?

Here in Australia, Swan is best remembered for his scoops about politicians abusing their parliamentary entitlements. Oh, and a story about a senator throwing kangaroo faeces at his brother.

Sorry, what?

The kangaroo poo story. You dont know about it?

No

Weird! Well, in 2013, thanks to a bizarre trick of electoral maths, a bunch of candidates from so-called micro parties found themselves elected to the Australian Senate despite receiving a minuscule number of votes. One of those lucky few was Ricky Muir, a candidate for the Motoring Enthusiasts party. While the rest of the country was still figuring out how the hell it had happened, Swan went digging into Muirs past and unearthed a video of the soon-to-be senator running around a campsite hurling kangaroo faeces at his brother while laughing hysterically.

Not all his stories were so, um, faecal, though. In 2014 Swan was awarded the prestigious Wallace Brown young achiever award for journalism after a string of scoops about the questionable use of taxpayer funds by politicians, which led to an overhaul of the rules governing parliamentary entitlements and expenses.

So, sounds as though he was well prepared for interviewing our president.

It certainly seems like it. Things didnt go so well the last time he interviewed Trump, though. Swan faced a ferocious backlash in 2018 and was labelled a bootlicker and called grotesque for the way he handled the presidents admission that he wanted to end automatic citizenship for immigrant children born in the US. In the interview, Swan smiled widely as Trump confirmed the news, and, as the New York Times put it, his tone-deaf delivery on Twitter (excited to share) left him open to criticism that he favours access over accountability. Despite landing a string of exclusives, including being the first to reveal the US withdrawal from the Paris climate accord, Swan was pigeonholed as the kind of inside-the-beltway reporter who cares more about the scoop than the audience.

This time, though, he treated Trump respectfully without bowing down as youd treat a friend who decides theyre a libertarian after reading Ayn Rand. His running commentary (what manuals?, who are you talking about?) felt like an echo of my own internal monologue whenever I listen to that guy.

Swans big insider guy energy seemed to help this time around. To me, the whole interview felt a little bit like being a fly on the wall in the kind of on background conversations journalists have all the time with sources. Swan is not a TV host, so his delivery was sort of ambling and chatty, which seemed to help. He pushed back, but he also got on Trumps level and gave the president all the rope he needed.

But, OK, lets get to the serious stuff. Is Jonathan Swan his real name? He sounds like an 18th-century poet or a 90s heartthrob.

Its real! In fact, hes from a famous line of Australian journalist Swans. His father, Norman Swan, is a physician and health reporter for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and is a celebrity in his own right. Norman has become ubiquitous during the pandemic, hosting a wildly popular podcast and showing up on our televisions to explain important subjects such as why we should wear face masks and whether our farts can spread Covid-19.

OK. Im starting to get a weird vibe from your countrys news cycle.

Right back at you!

Go here to read the rest:

Who is Jonathan Swan, the reporter who grilled Trump? And what do kangaroos have to do with it? - The Guardian