In a wide-ranging and fiery interview, Mitchell grilled Anthony Albanese over cost of living, anti-Semitism, immigration, Voluntary Assisted Dying, and legalising cannabis.
He even asked the Labor leader whether he could get the country to “lay off the Boomers”.
The most heated exchange came when Mitchell pressed Mr Albanese to apologise for Labor ministers calling Opposition leader Peter Dutton a “paedophile protector”.
The claims came after the Opposition voted against legislation that made it a criminal offence for child sex offenders in the cohort of 141 detainees released in the wake the NZYQ High Court decision to be near a school or childcare centre.
Mitchell said Labor’s name-calling went against Mr Albanese’s election promise to bring “more decency” and a “different style” of politics to government than what Australians had grown accustomed to.
He said the leader said he was “better than” name-calling, and pressed him to apologise to Mr Dutton for the ministers’ accusations, saying “you’re the boss!”
“Well, hang on, ask me about things I’ve done and I’ll be happy to be accountable for it,” the Prime Minister replied.
“Neil, he [Mr Dutton] moved a motion yesterday in the parliament saying essentially that we [Labor] wanted … child sex offenders, rapists, everyone, that we wanted them out on the streets. He did that yesterday in parliament.”
“So, in reply, you say he’s protecting pedophiles,” Mitchell interrupted.
“Terrific. Thank you for that. That’s a terrific standard of debate. You’ve really improved the quality of politics.
“That’s outrageous! I mean, alright he’s insulted you. Take the high moral ground and apologise.”
But Mr Albanese continued to insist he was “accountable for what I say”, and would “stand by” his ministers against Opposition accusations that Labor was “not concerned about community safety”.
“None of that is true, Neil, and you know that it is not true.”
He added: “Neil, I stand by everything. Everything that I say. And I stand by the fact that my ministers have been doing everything they can to protect community safety and Peter Dutton from day one has been focused on just politics.”
Mitchell said that both sides of the parliament “throwing abuse at each other” was feeding the public’s disenchantment with politics, as he warned Mr Albanese earlier in the interview that voters were “turning” against him.
“The polls are bad, the government is stumbling, you look tired, you could be chopped liver as well. What are you doing wrong?” Mitchell asked as his first question.
“I’m absolutely fine, Neil,” Albo insisted.
“It’s been a difficult time in terms of cost-of-living pressures that are on families. We get that. But I’m focused on delivering our election commitments … and on addressing taking pressure off Australians and we’re doing that.”
The PM also rejected the presenter’s “characterisation of the polls” being against him, or Mitchell’s assertion Labor was “looking like a one-term government”.
The radio host also challenged the Prime Minister for taking longer than expected to address rising anti-Semitism in Australia and “make the right statements”.
Mr Albanese said that was “complete nonsense” and accused Mitchell of attempting to “draw a political distinction over something like anti-Semitism”.
He also rejected attempts to “raise a fear campaign” against 800 Palestinians being granted temporary visas to enter Australia, knocking back Mitchell’s suggestion the refugees were “coming in pretty quickly”, and had not faced proper security screening.
In a lighter turn to the pair’s final on-air conversation, Mitchell prodded the Labor leader about legalising cannabis attempting to get him to admit if he had ever “smoked weed” before – as a number of Victorian MPs had this past week.
“Oh come on, you went to university. You just told us about that. University in the 70s. Are you telling me you didn’t smoke dope?” he challenged, but the PM decided to “take the fifth” and not answer.
Despite the heated interview, Mr Albanese congratulated the outgoing radio presenter for his “extraordinary career” and being a constant in people’s lives.
“You are a person of great integrity and you have my respect and my best wishes.”