Vaughan Smith

Journalist. Founder @frontlineclub. Author of The Extraction Pattern (June 2026).

[Vaughan Smith @VaughanSmith]

I was miserable to see the state of Julian Assange’s health yesterday at his hearing at Marylebone Magistrates Court. He is being kept in solitary confinement in Belmarsh prison for 22 hours a day. He is very thin and struggles even to speak properly.
He pleaded with the...

[Vaughan Smith @VaughanSmith]

https://t.co/lUK1tQEWWf

[Vaughan Smith @VaughanSmith]

In November 2025 the Post Office quietly extended Fujitsu's Horizon contract by £49 million. The procurement notice itself: 'It would not be possible to simply hand this system over to another supplier.' No British national paper covered it. Computer Weekly did.

[Vaughan Smith @VaughanSmith]

https://t.co/4J9kS1h9UK

[Vaughan Smith @VaughanSmith]

Shipowners in 1873 were drowning their own crews for the insurance. Sailors who refused to board were jailed for desertion. It took a failed coal merchant who had never been to sea to paint a line on the hull that stopped it.
We need to paint the line again.

[Vaughan Smith @VaughanSmith]

https://t.co/4J9kS1h9UK

[Vaughan Smith @VaughanSmith]

87% of family court cases the Domestic Abuse Commissioner reviewed involved domestic abuse.
11% centrally considered it.
The system sees the pattern and does not process what it sees. There is a question every judge could use on Monday morning that would catch it.

[Vaughan Smith @VaughanSmith]

Under the 2015 Iran deal, breakout time was twelve months.
By the time the bombs fell, breakout time was one week.
Most analysis blames Trump. My new piece shows the architecture.
https://t.co/QDkx96IaOJ

[Vaughan Smith @VaughanSmith]

Hungary won the election. Now it has to win the state. What Poland's two years tell us about what Magyar faces next. https://t.co/dOsmx61pRN

[Vaughan Smith @VaughanSmith]

I've been writing. The Extraction Pattern publishes in June – why institutions keep failing the people they were built to protect.
Weekly analysis, free: https://t.co/dOsmx61pRN

[Ruth Davidson @RuthDavidsonPC]

Channel 4 is publicly owned, not publicly funded. It doesn't cost the tax payer a penny. It also, by charter, commissions content but doesn't make/own its own. It's one of the reasons we have such a thriving indy sector in places like Glasgow. This is the opposite of levelling up

[Annas Alamudi @sorslibertas]

@VaughanSmith Good to chat with you at the border today.

[Vaughan Smith @VaughanSmith]

Mantas Kvedaravičius, was killed in Mariupol, reported, a camera still in his hands. #Press #journalistsafety #reporter #ukraine #ukrainewar #camera #truth #WERemember #straightfromthefrontline #sftf #8 ‘Safeguard The Press, Defend Democracy’.
8 journalists now killed in Ukraine.

[Vaughan Smith @VaughanSmith]

#StraightFromTheFrontline in Lviv, Ukraine.
With Paul and Yaroslav, here supporting freelancers and local journalists for the Frontline Club and The Frontline Freelance Register(FFR).

[Fernando @TheThinker1958]

@A_Loyd_Times 😟

[WikiLeaks @wikileaks]

David Davis MP, former Conservative Party chairman, says Assange judge ‘got the law wrong’ | #Assange @DavidDavisMP

https://t.co/g7ZP7rAXNW

[alan rusbridger @arusbridger]

‘Shame on the whole damn lot.” Former Conservative MP Matthew Parris on Ministers colluding in something they don’t, in their hearts, believe - and which they know will damage the UK

[Nils Melzer @NilsMelzer]

Thanks to @Lawyers4Assange & the growing number of World Leaders calling for an end of the persecution of #Assange & standing up for justice, rule of law & press freedom!
In a time of political & moral implosion & denial of reality, what we need is political courage & leadership!

[Vaughan Smith @VaughanSmith]

Worrying times for press freedom. John Shipton, Julian Assange’s father outside the Old Bailey.