“Get the b*tch”: The political dirt units targeting journalists

Summary

Podcast Summary:

7am – “Get the b*tch”: The political dirt units targeting journalists
Host: Daniel James (A)
Guest: Amy Remeikis (Contributing Editor, The New Daily)
Date: July 9, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Daniel James interviews journalist Amy Remeikis about the covert and sometimes overt operations by political "dirt units" in Australia that seek to intimidate, surveil, and discredit journalists—often through personal, gendered, or professionally damaging campaigns. The discussion explores how these tactics work, their impact on freedom of the press and democracy, and the particular ways women journalists are targeted. Amy also shares her personal experiences, highlighting the risks and the importance of calling out such intimidation.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Personal Experience with Targeting and Surveillance

• Amy shares a recent warning from a political contact: operatives were "looking for dirt" on her, including who she might have "slept with" or whether she had relationships with politicians.
  • Notable Quote:
    “They're really going after you this time. I think you need to take care.” (Amy, 01:18)
• The pervasiveness of such tactics is emphasized: they happen often, typically through personal networks warning journalists:
  • Quote:
    "It'll be another journalist who lets you know that somebody is looking for something…or a political contact…this is what's going on behind the scenes." (Amy, 01:55)
• Amy describes the psychological effect of always feeling watched, surveilled, or that even innocuous interactions (like a coffee with a politician) might spark rumors.
  • Quote:
    "You feel surveilled, you feel like you're being watched, that all of your conversations are being picked over for political gain.” (Amy, 02:27)

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2. Mechanics of Political Dirt Units

• Breakdown of the types of dirt units:
  • Professional Dirt Units:
    Staffers and operatives within party structures, often working within the boundaries of law and using publicly available information (e.g., inconsistencies, undeclared interests).
    • Example: "shit sheets" with contradictions, registers of interests, past statements.
    • Quote:
      "All mainstream political parties have what they call dirt units... they're usually staffers within senior ministerial offices." (Amy, 04:21)
  • Unprofessional/Vicious Dirt Units:
    Operate outside mainstream parties or official channels—relying on smears, personal attacks, and rumors not fit for print but effective at intimidation and damaging reputations.
    • Quote:
      "The purpose is not to discredit, credit that person publicly… it’s to try and start a bit of a campaign behind the scenes." (Amy, 07:19)

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3. The Chilling Effect on Journalism and Democracy

• The more insidious dirt campaigns are difficult to measure for effectiveness since their impact is often invisible: stories possibly not written, or topics avoided due to perceived personal risk.
  • Quote:
    "It's hard to say how effective they are because you'd never truly see them." (Amy, 08:23)
• Even systematic micro-complaints from powerful individuals or organizations can create a hostile environment for journalists and editors, pressuring them to avoid certain topics/individuals.
  • Quote:
    “…it creates this sort of situation where it's easier in some cases to just not talk about it than to deal with... the barrage of correspondence that follows a mention of that particular person…” (Amy, 09:34)
• The net result is a narrowing of public discourse—reduced willingness to take on certain stories, which is “chilling” for democracy.
  • Quote:
    “…we are narrowing the field of what opinions, stories, and issues we can cover, and that is not good for democracy.” (Amy, 10:59)

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4. Sexism and the Targeting of Women Journalists

• Amy describes how attacks often target women through their sexuality, appearance, or supposed relationships—using double standards and misogyny.
  • Quote:
    "Obviously it’s misogyny, because it's really easy... to just discredit a woman over her sexuality, over, you know, her relationships or, you know, she's dressing provocatively, so therefore you can't listen to anything she’s saying..." (Amy, 11:40)
• The political context has intensified this: gender rights and women’s issues are political flashpoints, making vocal women more frequent and harsher targets.
  • Explains double standards: men “get a pass,” women's mistakes can end careers.

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5. Calling Out the Intimidation

• Amy acknowledges the rare decision to publicly call out these tactics, despite risk of escalation.
  • Quote:
    “I’ve already heard from…contacts that…‘I'm going to get the b*tch’, which was what was…passed on to me. And sure, I mean, they can go their hardest.” (Amy, 13:19)
• Notes that media organizations often discourage openness about these attacks, fearing it undermines objectivity or damages the perception of their reporting.
  • Quote:
    "Media companies…don’t like to acknowledge that this happens because they feel like it might impact how people view their reporting if their journalists are saying, 'Hey, I’m under attack for this.'" (Amy, 13:54)
• Emphasizes importance of breaking silence—not for her own sake, but because these campaigns assault public discourse and democracy itself.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments (with Timestamps)

• 01:18 | Amy, on the warning:
  “They’re really going after you this time. I think you need to take care.”
• 02:27 | Amy, on feeling surveilled:
  “You feel surveilled, you feel like you’re being watched, that all your conversations are being picked over for political gain.”
• 04:21 | Amy, on parties’ dirt units:
  “All mainstream political parties have what they call dirt units…They’re usually staffers within senior ministerial offices.”
• 07:19 | Amy, on unprofessional dirt campaigns:
  “…the purpose is not to discredit…publicly… it’s to try and start a bit of a campaign behind the scenes… designed to intimidate you into silence.”
• 08:23 | Amy, on the invisible impact:
  “It’s hard to say how effective they are because you’d never truly see them.”
• 09:34 | Amy, on micro-complaints:
  “…it creates this sort of situation where it’s easier in some cases to just not talk about it than to deal with what… is going to be the barrage of correspondence…”
• 10:59 | Amy, on democracy:
  “…we are narrowing the field of what opinions, stories and issues we can cover, and that is not good for democracy.”
• 11:40 | Amy, on sexism can be weaponized:
  “Obviously it’s misogyny, because it’s really easy…to just discredit a woman over her sexuality, over…her relationships, or…she’s dressing provocatively, so therefore, you can’t listen to anything she’s saying.”
• 13:19 | Amy, on hearing “get the b*tch”:
  “…it’s targeted at me and I’m going to get the bitch. Which was what was…passed on to me.”
• 13:54 | Amy, on why media companies discourage speaking out:
  “Media companies and media editors, they don’t like to acknowledge that this happens because they feel like it might impact how people view their reporting…”
• 14:39 | Daniel’s eerie sign-off:
  “…there may be people listening to this conversation right now.”

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Important Timestamps

• 00:01 – 03:34: Amy details her personal experiences and the impact on journalists' sense of safety.
• 04:02 – 07:19: Deep dive into how dirt units operate—professional vs. unprofessional units.
• 08:06 – 10:59: Discussion of the broader chilling effect on journalism, democracy, and freedom of press.
• 11:23 – 13:03: The gendered dimension of attacks—how sexism intensifies the threats against women.
• 13:03 – 14:39: The risks and importance of calling out these intimidation efforts.

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Tone and Language

The tone is candid, urgent, and reflective; Amy is forthright about the ugly realities of media politics while Daniel maintains a deeply empathetic and probing role. There is an undercurrent of concern for both individual and democratic welfare, as well as frustration at the normalization of these shadowy tactics.

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Conclusion

This episode of 7am is an unflinching examination of how political dirt units target, surveil, and attempt to intimidate journalists—especially women—in Australia. Through Amy's lived experience and critical insight, listeners are given a rare look into both the mechanics of these campaigns and their corrosive effect on public debate and democracy. The episode is a call for transparency, solidarity among journalists, and vigilance from the public about threats to press freedoms.

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Transcript

[A]

I'm Daniel James and you're listening to 7am. A call came through with a warning. Political operatives were digging for dirt. For Amy Remicus, it wasn't the first time, but this time, she was told, was more vicious than usual. In Canberra, that kind of warning is part of the machinery. A whisper campaign, a rumour, a file passed around backgrounding against opponents or perceived threats to vested interests. Enough to make a journalist think twice about who they speak to, where they go and what stories they pursue. Too often for women in public life, the tactics are familiar and designed to cut deep. Today, a contributing editor at the New Daily, Amy Ramikis, on the forces trying to intimidate journalists and why she decided to call it out. It's Friday, july 10th. Amy. So you get a phone call from a political contact of yours warning you that a so called political operative or operatives are, quote, looking for dirt. What were you told?

[B]

Yeah, so this has happened several times in my career and I'm certainly not the only journalist that this happens to. It happens quite frequently. I think people would be surprised how often it happens. The most recent time was, you know, literally just somebody a couple of weeks ago saying, hey, just thought I'd let you know. I had a conversation with blah blah and they said that blah, blah, political operative is looking for dirt on you, wanting to know who you've slept with, whether it's possible you've had a relationship with. Insert politician's name here. They're really going after you this time. I think you need to take care. And that's usually the way that it happens. It'll be another journalist who lets you know that somebody is looking for something or that somebody is spreading a rumour about you, or it'll be a political contact that you have yourself who's going, hey, just thought you need to know that this is what's going on behind the scenes.

[A]

That's a pretty unsettling thing to hear. What was your reaction? I know that you said that this has happened before, but I mean, does it make you worried? Does it make you feel less safe?

[B]

Yeah, it's strange because like, you know, most journalists have nothing to worry about, right? Like I have not had any relationships with politicians or staffers or anyone within the political sphere. And even if I had, I would certainly declare it. What is the issue is that you do feel surveilled, you feel like you're being watched, that all of your conversations are being picked over for political gain. You start thinking about like maybe you've had a joke with Somebody that could be misinterpreted if it's for, like, you know, a wider audience or something like that. It gets to the point where, you know, you can have a very normal coffee with somebody in your work field. So I had a coffee catch up with a politician when I recently went into state. This is something very normal. It's part of my job to keep an eye on politics across the country, state and federal, just to know what is coming. And I get a call a couple of hours later saying, oh, by the way, you were spotted, spotted having this coffee with this male politician.

[A]

It must be so unnerving.

[B]

Yeah, it is, because, I mean, obviously you're in public, you've got nothing to hide, it's just a work conversation, but it somehow gets back to whoever it is is like, you know, deciding that they've got a grudge against you. And it feeds into this whole, I am constantly under surveillance and again, I am not the only journalist that this happens to. It's just increasing in its viciousness and it's increasing in its frequency.

[A]

Let's talk about these political dirt units more broadly. I mean, what are they and how are they used against journalists, politicians and parties?

[B]

There's a couple of different types of dirt units, so there's political operatives and then there's the political parties themselves.

[A]

Meanwhile, I note the Treasurer's dirt unit has been briefing slippery.

[B]

All mainstream political parties have what they call dirt units. The Prime Minister needs to stop worrying about getting more evidence in his dirt unit. They're usually staffers within senior ministerial offices.

[A]

But what the labor dirt unit does is give the notes to the members and they come in here and just assiduously read them and think that that's all true and all right.

[B]

Often you'll find senators, staffers who are part of dirt units because that's part of what the Senate does. Bill shorten would be embarrassed to watch the juvenile nature of his senators here in the Senate trying to do the

[A]

bidding of this student politics dirt unit.

[B]

A senator's job is to increase the representation of their political party in the broad. And part of that is knowing a little bit about something that all enemies, you know, within your tent, outside the tent and on the other side of politics.

[A]

I say to the Leader of the Opposition, he needs to spend less time on his dirt unit and more time in the red dirt, in the red dirt of the top end.

[B]

And so the way that, you know, the Labour dirt unit used to do it was journalists would be given what is called a shit sheet and that basically involves a list of publicly available information about contradictions in something that somebody might have said, declarations that were or were not made on the interest register, previous life experience that may now be hypocritical or pertinent to what they're doing and hasn't necessarily been declared.

[A]

So why did your government need a list of the top 20 marginals? In order to allocate tax taxpayer money to projects in coalition seats under the Community Car Park Fund.

[B]

And the Liberal Party dote unit is very similar. Anthony Albanese is the proud new owner of a Central coast beach house worth more than $4 million. Locals are excited about their new neighbours, but political rivals have hit out at the Prime Minister's purchase in the middle of a housing crisis. Most of that dirt unit stuff done through the political parties is publicly available information.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And that is because, for all intents and purposes, they're professional outfits and they are trying to work with what is within the bounds of the law in order to report more sordid allegations against one time federal opposition leader and now New South Wales MP Mark Latham have emerged like they want their target to be discredited, they want that piece to go to print or to be broadcast. And so it has to fit within the law.

[A]

So when it comes to young people in this country, are you really on their side? Or as young people would say, is it all about getting that bread for the tax man? Are you sure young people say that, Andrew?

[B]

So that's the sort of professional dirt unit. But then on the other side of that you have like the, I suppose the unprofessional dirt units, which tend to be a lot more vicious, which tend to go outside the bounds of anything anyone would print. And the purpose is not to discredit, credit that person publicly because they know that these stories won't go to print. It's to try and start a bit of a campaign behind the scenes. Maybe stuff pops up on social media, maybe the whispers start being made around your colleagues or other people in, within your work circle. Maybe it's just something that, you know, people are talking about more broadly or even that, you know, that they're hunting for dirt and that is designed to intimidate you into silence.

[A]

Coming up, the chilling effect of these political hit jobs on journalists and democracy. So, Amy, how effective are these dirt units and what they do in terms

[B]

of the, the more insidious dirt campaigns that get run? It's hard to say how effective they are because you'd never truly see them. So you don't know, if a journalist was thinking about running a story and then didn't because, you know, they received some personal threats or they just felt that the personal cost was too high. I personally don't know any journalist who has been targeted, who has not still done their job and gone just as hard after, you know, whatever it is that's in the public interest that somebody knows about a political party or a political operative. But that's not to say that it doesn't happen. The other way that we see this happening is not necessarily even direct what we would consider, you know, threats. Sometimes it's just very powerful people who are monitoring everything that is said in media. And if there is somebody who misspeaks or who is not quite as tight in their language as they should be when describing a situation, there'll be a letter fired off from that organization or that person to all of the bosses. And that happens, you know, quite frequently, all of these little micro complaints. And it creates this sort of situation where it's easier in some cases to just not talk about it than to deal with what, you know is going to be the barrage of correspondence that follows a mention of that particular person, organization, or issue.

[A]

So are these tactics having a chilling effect across the industry when it comes to reporting and journalism?

[B]

I think it's a threat to press freedom. I think that it's something that people should be speaking about more openly because it's one of those cases where sunlight is one of the best disinfectants. It's something that other journalists should know that they're not alone in and that it's not something that they're going through alone. And by and large it means that they're doing their job. But every time I get one of these calls or I've had a direct threat from somebody, and that happens too, where you'll get directly threatened. You know that you're doing the right thing. But you do worry about the people around you. You worry about the impact on your family, your loved ones, your friends, on your career. And they do chip away at your reputation. And even if it's not a direct threat, even if it's just bombarding an organization or a media outlet with complaints and correspondence and all the rest of it. Even that then has an impact, because then others go, it's just easier not to use that journalist. It's just easier not to cover that issue because of what is going to come after it. And that is something that should be chilling for people who are interested in us actually having a free and Open debate, because we are narrowing the field of what opinions, stories, and issues we can cover, and that is not good for democracy.

[A]

How much of a role does sexism play in some of these attacks, Amy, including those against you? Because we've seen outspoken, progressive women targeted pretty harshly across the board. People like Grace Tame and Abby Chatfield yourself. What is it about strong women that triggers some people?

[B]

Yeah, I mean, like, obviously it's misogyny, because it's really easy in this day and age to just discredit a woman over her sexuality, over, you know, her relationships or, you know, she's dressing provocatively, so therefore you can't listen to anything that she's saying. She's showing cleavage, therefore you can't listen to anything that she's saying. And there is still, particularly in this time when we're seeing gender rights being made political once again, where we have the woman's right to choose coming under political attack in America. They're having a very live debate over whether or not women should still have the vote. You start to see women be attacked a lot more for that. And that is because men in the media, in politics, tend to get a pass for these things. You know, you could be in a powerful position, cheat on your wife, have a. Have a baby with your affair partner, and that's just fine. That's just human nature. But if a woman, you know, slips up in her personal life, then that is enough to basically remove her from the public sphere altogether. And that, that. That always exists. And women tend to push back a little bit more, in my experience, about what's. What's happening, which tends to, you know, inversely create more people who start coming after you for daring to raise something that you're supposed to just keep in the shadows.

[A]

And finally, Amy, you say that this is pretty common and becoming more common, but it is uncommon to hear someone like you call it out as you are now. Do you worry that by doing that, the people who are targeting you may use that as an excuse to go even harder?

[B]

Yeah, I mean, I've already heard from, like, other political contacts that, you know, there's a few people who, who were like, it's targeted at me and I'm going to get the bitch. Which was what was, you know, passed on to me. Which, yeah, that always comes with it. And sure, I mean, they can go their hardest. There's not a lot that they can get because I am ethical about the way that I do my job. But I also am in a position where I, you know, I have a platform where it's safer for me to be able to call this out than it is for somebody who is, you know, working under a more mainstream masthead. Because that's the other thing. Media companies and media editors, they don't like to acknowledge that this happens because they feel like it might impact how people view their reporting if their journalists are saying, hey, I'm under attack for this. You know, some editors see that as an assault on objectivity. Ultimately, this is not about the journalists. This is not about me. It's about the assault on democracy and it's about the narrowing of the debate in Australia and having these vested interests try and dictate what is and isn't acceptable discourse.

[A]

Well, Amy, thank you for writing about it and I don't want to unnerve you, but there may be people listening to this conversation right now.

[B]

Yes, I know. Freaky God, you mean I'm not just talking to you, Daniel? My God, are you one of them?

[A]

Thanks, Amy.

[B]

Thank you.

[A]

Also in the news, anti Semitism envoy Gillian Siegel is calling for a new oversight committee to keep an eye on the ABC and SBS Israel coverage. She told the Royal Commission into Anti Semitism that there has been a common perception in the Jewish community that the public broadcasters coverage lacks balance and has an over emphasis on Gaza compared with other conflicts. ABC and SBS bosses have pushed back against calls for more oversight, defending their coverage and editorial standards. Napoleon Hanson is set to appear on a podcast with the far right figure that triggered Carl Stefanovic sacking UK extremist. Tommy Robinson, a convicted criminal and anti Islamic agitator, is promoting the episode as a fascinating chat with one of the bravest ladies on the planet and hopefully the next leader of her nation. I'm Daniel James. Thanks for listening to 7am we'll be back tomorrow.