It was certainly a tough week for ABC host Tony Armstrong, who faced backlash over his ‘divisive’ Australia Day special that one Liberal politician called an ‘all-time low’ for the public broadcaster.
But we hear he’s also feeling the strain on the home front.
Whispers in the TV industry suggest his relationship with activist, artist and DJ Rona Glynn-McDonald has quietly come to an end, two years after their public debut.
The Daily Mail made several attempts to contact Armstrong and Glynn-McDonald for comment last week but received no response.
Eventually, we approached the former News Breakfast sports presenter in person as he visited a café in Brunswick, Melbourne, on Thursday.
The Logie winner, 36, who was out walking his dogs with his friend Karl, dodged our questions, but wasn’t in a rush to deny the break-up rumour either.
Whispers in the TV industry suggest ABC host Tony Armstrong’s relationship with activist and DJ Rona Glynn-McDonald has quietly come to an end, two years after their public debut
The Mail made several attempts to contact the pair for comment last week but received no response. Eventually, we approached Armstrong in person at a café in Brunswick on Thursday
The Logie winner, 36, who was out walking his dogs with his friend Karl (left), dodged our questions, but wasn’t in a rush to deny the break-up rumour either
‘I don’t… It’s okay. I’m just catching up with my mate, Karl, if that’s okay? We’re just catching up. We haven’t caught up in a while,’ he said.
Armstrong, a former AFL footballer who played 35 games for Adelaide, Sydney and Collingwood, didn’t seem surprised by the question, having previously been contacted by our reporter online.
However, all further queries were met with silence, with Armstrong refusing to confirm or deny whether he and Glynn-McDonald were still an item.
Armstrong has been in Melbourne while weathering the storm over his TV special Always Was Tonight, which aired on the ABC the Wednesday before Australia Day.
Meanwhile, Glynn-McDonald, who is the daughter of film director Warwick Thornton, has been in Sydney, working and attending a First Nations symposium.
The couple debuted their relationship in November 2023 after dating for ‘a while’, and later posed for a full photo spread for News Corp’s Stellar magazine.
At the time, Glynn-McDonald joked on Stellar’s Something to Talk About podcast that Armstrong had ‘stalked’ her, before clarifying they had actually been on each other’s radar for a while.
‘We kind of had been operating in similar-ish circles,’ she said.
‘I don’t… It’s okay. I’m just catching up with my mate, Karl, if that’s okay? We’re just catching up. We haven’t caught up in a while,’ the former AFL player said when asked about the split
Armstrong has been in Melbourne while weathering the storm over his TV special Always Was Tonight, which aired on the ABC the Wednesday before Australia Day
Armstrong added of their romance: ‘It’s been great, honestly, been awesome.’
Glynn-McDonald claimed she wasn’t aware of Armstrong’s public profile before they met and only realised when other people filled her in on his career.
‘I saw your Instagram and I think a couple of people had mentioned your name, and I was like, “Who? Tony who?”‘ she said.
Within weeks of going public, Armstrong had introduced his girlfriend to his mother over Christmas that year.
He also told the Mail at the TikTok Awards in December 2023 that he was happy for their relationship to be out in the open and that he was feeling optimistic.
‘It’s just nice that people know about it now,’ Armstrong said.
‘We’ve been together for a while now. I’m happy. [Life] has just been good lately.’
Despite whispers of their break-up and a telling lack of denials, Armstrong and Glynn-McDonald continue to follow each other on Instagram.
This suggests the split may have been amicable.
In May last year, Armstrong credited Glynn-McDonald with giving him the confidence he needed to walk away from ABC News Breakfast when he knew the job was impacting his health.
‘I decided about halfway through last year that was going to be it for breakfast [TV] because it was killing me,’ he told Ruby Hall on The Inherited Podcast.
‘Literally I ended up staying in bed for a month because I just couldn’t get up.
‘I was rostered and I just couldn’t get out of bed. Rona was like, “Look, your body is telling you that you need to resign.”
‘And I was like, “But I’ve finally got a job that is secure.” And you know what this business is like – it’s pretty fickle – and I’ve never really been someone who thinks, “I’ll be right, I’m established enough to do what I want.”
Last May, Armstrong credited Glynn-McDonald with giving him the confidence he needed to walk away from ABC News Breakfast when he knew the job was impacting his health
The couple debuted their relationship in November 2023 after dating for ‘a while’, and later posed in full photo spread for News Corp’s Stellar magazine. (Pictured on December 2, 2023)
‘So Rona helped me get into the right headspace to leave telly. She got me to the line to look after my own health rather than job security, I suppose.
‘I’m really proud that we were able to step away and I did that through her help.
‘Vice versa she’s stepped away a lot from her not-for-profits to chase her dreams in music. I’m proud of us for navigating how it all works.’
It’s been months since either of them appeared in photos together online, but they do still occasionally engage with each other’s content.
Most recently, Glynn-McDonald was seen commenting, ‘Brilliant,’ beneath a clip from Armstrong’s recent controversial ABC show Always Was Tonight.
The satirical Australia Day special made headlines when critics complained it attacked national institutions and crossed editorial and classification boundaries.
Calls for a formal investigation into the ABC following the 30-minute program, which aired ahead of January 26, have since escalated.
Coalition figures condemned the segment and have urged the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) to investigate how it was approved.
Federal opposition communications spokeswoman Melissa McIntosh labelled the broadcast an ‘all-time low’ for the public broadcaster and said its timing was ‘abominable’, coming weeks after the Bondi attack.
‘Our nation was rocked by the horrors at Bondi,’ she said. ‘Now our national broadcaster is further fuelling division in our communities with this rubbish.’
The ABC has rejected claims the program was designed to divide audiences, defending the show as satire that aimed to highlight Indigenous perspectives.
‘Always Was Tonight examined Indigenous Australians’ lived experiences through satire, social observation and comedy,’ an ABC spokesperson said.
‘The program was creative, insightful and sometimes challenging. It sought not to divide, but to contribute to a shared understanding.’
