WEBVTT - Albo v Trump: Oct 20. Let’s goooooo. 0:00:00.320 --> 0:00:02.040 It's been so much talk about whether or not you're 0:00:02.040 --> 0:00:04.640 getting a face to face meeting with journals. 0:00:05.120 --> 0:00:07.680 I'm going to tell you when I'm out there in 0:00:07.720 --> 0:00:11.800 the real world, I do not get asked about it. 0:00:11.920 --> 0:00:16.160 The Prime Minister keeps on saying that everyone's overplaying the 0:00:16.160 --> 0:00:18.680 fact that he hasn't managed to have a meeting, and 0:00:18.720 --> 0:00:21.200 the media is obsessed with it, and we should all 0:00:21.200 --> 0:00:21.880 give it a rest. 0:00:22.040 --> 0:00:22.799 We're obsessed with it. 0:00:22.840 --> 0:00:25.119 Will you have a face to face meeting with Donald Trump? Well, 0:00:25.440 --> 0:00:27.760 when we do, you'll know about it, so it's not 0:00:27.800 --> 0:00:28.200 booked up. 0:00:28.200 --> 0:00:31.360 But the truth is this is a really important bilateral relationship. 0:00:31.800 --> 0:00:34.480 The government acknowledges that the United States is our most 0:00:34.520 --> 0:00:38.320 important security partner, and the president has been in office 0:00:38.320 --> 0:00:41.480 since January and was elected last November, which is coming 0:00:41.520 --> 0:00:44.080 up for eleven months ago, and the two of them 0:00:44.120 --> 0:00:45.640 haven't eyeballed each other yet. 0:00:46.800 --> 0:00:50.560 Karen Middleton is a political journalist and author of Albanesi 0:00:50.760 --> 0:00:54.520 Telling It Straight, and while Anthony Alberanzi has been playing 0:00:54.560 --> 0:00:56.639 down the fact that he hasn't had a one on 0:00:56.640 --> 0:00:59.920 one meeting with Trump yet, Karen says it actually tells 0:01:00.120 --> 0:01:02.680 us a lot about the state of the relationship between 0:01:02.680 --> 0:01:07.000 our two countries. Now, finally, after a huge effort from 0:01:07.040 --> 0:01:09.959 the Australian government, there's a date on the calendar with 0:01:10.040 --> 0:01:12.320 the two leaders set to meet in the Oval Office 0:01:12.400 --> 0:01:15.920 on the twentieth of October. So will it go the 0:01:15.920 --> 0:01:19.360 way of Zelenski's meeting in the Oval Office? And how 0:01:19.480 --> 0:01:22.880 is the Prime Minister preparing for this unpredictable face off. 0:01:26.400 --> 0:01:30.280 I'm Ruby Jones and you're listening to seven AM today 0:01:30.520 --> 0:01:34.679 Karen Middleton on Albanezy Trump and what Australia stands to 0:01:34.720 --> 0:01:46.200 win and lose. It's Monday, September twenty nine. So Karen, 0:01:46.280 --> 0:01:49.920 given how long Trump has been in office, now, what 0:01:50.160 --> 0:01:52.760 does it say to you that it has taken this 0:01:52.880 --> 0:01:55.880 long for a date for a meeting to be set. 0:01:56.080 --> 0:01:58.440 Well, you know, you could say he's a busy man. 0:01:58.960 --> 0:02:01.840 He's got a long list of people who want to 0:02:01.880 --> 0:02:04.520 see him. But I think it's hard to avoid the 0:02:04.560 --> 0:02:08.360 conclusion that Australia was not right up there among his 0:02:08.480 --> 0:02:11.640 top priorities. The two leaders had agreed to meet on 0:02:11.680 --> 0:02:14.800 the sidelines at the G seven in Canada, and the 0:02:14.840 --> 0:02:17.440 President then had to leave early because of developments in 0:02:17.480 --> 0:02:20.040 the Middle East. So that's a very plausible explanation for 0:02:20.120 --> 0:02:25.920 early departure. But he has left summits early before without 0:02:25.960 --> 0:02:28.840 such a plausible explanation. And if you look at the 0:02:28.840 --> 0:02:31.560 company that Albanezi was in at the bottom of the 0:02:31.639 --> 0:02:36.600 list of meetings that Donald Trump had scheduled at the summit, 0:02:37.120 --> 0:02:39.640 it suggests that these were all people with whom he 0:02:39.680 --> 0:02:44.560 had some kind of disagreement. You know, the leaders of Mexico, India, 0:02:44.760 --> 0:02:48.440 South Korea, and of course the president of Ukraine who 0:02:48.560 --> 0:02:51.960 Donald Trump famously ambushed in the Oval Office earlier in 0:02:52.000 --> 0:02:55.040 the year. These were all people with whom Donald Trump 0:02:55.080 --> 0:02:59.359 has had skirmishes or disagreements in recent times, and all 0:02:59.400 --> 0:03:02.320 of them, Anthony Alberanzi were the people who got their 0:03:02.320 --> 0:03:06.079 meetings canceled. And on top of that, soon after the summer, 0:03:06.160 --> 0:03:09.960 Donald Trump either spoke to or met with all of 0:03:10.000 --> 0:03:13.360 those others, but not Anthony Albernizi. So it's hard to 0:03:13.960 --> 0:03:16.359 avoid this conclusion that there was some kind of. 0:03:16.320 --> 0:03:21.080 A message in there. Okay, So, while publicly Anthony Alberzi 0:03:21.160 --> 0:03:24.520 has been saying that not having a meeting with Trump 0:03:25.080 --> 0:03:27.560 is not a very big deal, can we assume that 0:03:27.720 --> 0:03:31.440 privately the government has been trying to make this meeting happen. 0:03:31.480 --> 0:03:33.800 What do we know about what has been going on 0:03:33.880 --> 0:03:36.160 behind the scenes to get to this point. 0:03:36.320 --> 0:03:39.680 Well, it certainly seems that's the case. They've been looking 0:03:39.720 --> 0:03:41.720 forward to the meeting in Canada, and I think since 0:03:41.720 --> 0:03:44.840 then they've been trying to make sure that that a 0:03:44.880 --> 0:03:49.520 meeting does take place. We saw the Defense Minister, Richard Miles, 0:03:49.520 --> 0:03:52.680 who's also the Deputy Prime Minister, race off to Washington 0:03:52.760 --> 0:03:56.560 in late August. They still haven't really explained what that 0:03:56.760 --> 0:03:59.640 was about, but he did meet with Marco Rubio, the 0:03:59.720 --> 0:04:03.560 secondary State and National Security Advisor, who's also the person 0:04:03.600 --> 0:04:08.320 in the administration responsible for coordinating the president's bilateral meetings, 0:04:08.720 --> 0:04:11.640 so maybe there is a clue there. He came home 0:04:11.680 --> 0:04:14.520 and a week later there was another phone call between 0:04:14.560 --> 0:04:16.680 the President and the Prime Minister, and it seems that 0:04:17.000 --> 0:04:19.840 maybe it was that call, or even a subsequent one 0:04:19.880 --> 0:04:22.560 that we hadn't heard about, that has locked in this 0:04:22.680 --> 0:04:25.920 October twenty date. And since then, we've had a number 0:04:25.920 --> 0:04:29.400 of announcements from the government that would be probably received 0:04:29.440 --> 0:04:33.719 positively in the United States, like what, well, we know 0:04:33.839 --> 0:04:37.400 the United States administration wants Australia to increase its defense 0:04:37.440 --> 0:04:41.080 spending from somewhere around two point three percent of GDP 0:04:41.320 --> 0:04:44.560 to three point five percent of GDP. The government has 0:04:44.560 --> 0:04:47.200 pushed back on that and said, what we'll do is 0:04:47.279 --> 0:04:50.720 decide what we need to acquire, what capability we need, 0:04:50.760 --> 0:04:53.880 and we're not going to be tied to a percentage. 0:04:54.640 --> 0:04:58.400 But since then you've certainly seen announcements that are about 0:04:58.480 --> 0:04:59.279 defense spending. 0:05:00.000 --> 0:05:04.839 So today's investment is another way we're delivering record defense 0:05:04.920 --> 0:05:10.800 funding to bolster Australia's capabilities. We're investing in our capability 0:05:11.240 --> 0:05:13.560 and we're investing in our relationships. 0:05:13.640 --> 0:05:16.600 We saw one recently a twelve billion dollar upgrade of 0:05:16.640 --> 0:05:20.200 the Henderson Defense Precinct in Western Australia, which is where 0:05:20.600 --> 0:05:23.520 the Orchest submarines will be based and will be used 0:05:23.560 --> 0:05:26.960 as a maintenance hub for American submarines as well. And 0:05:27.000 --> 0:05:29.680 we've also seen Richard Miles start talking about using a 0:05:29.680 --> 0:05:33.760 different metric, a different way of assessing the percentage of 0:05:33.760 --> 0:05:34.480 defense spending. 0:05:34.640 --> 0:05:37.840 The percentage GDP number is not one that we focus on, 0:05:38.680 --> 0:05:42.359 I mean, and partly that's because others do, sure, but 0:05:42.400 --> 0:05:44.880 obviously the Americans do. And these are your numbers about 0:05:45.040 --> 0:05:46.360 what it's getting to. Two point three percent. 0:05:46.400 --> 0:05:47.159 So what will this mean? 0:05:47.520 --> 0:05:50.200 Yeah, but partly why we don't focus on it is 0:05:50.240 --> 0:05:53.599 because you can look at a different arrange of different measures. 0:05:53.640 --> 0:05:56.800 Meaning it says if they were using the formula that 0:05:57.000 --> 0:05:59.920 NATO users, then we'd be up to two point eight 0:06:00.000 --> 0:06:02.520 percent already. So you've got those two things a bit 0:06:02.520 --> 0:06:06.040 of a hint that they are, while not wanting to 0:06:06.200 --> 0:06:10.320 change Australian policy to suit the United States, prepared to 0:06:10.400 --> 0:06:13.880 take some steps to appease their concerns. And we also 0:06:13.960 --> 0:06:17.919 saw Penny Wong make an announcement recently on Russian sanctions. 0:06:17.960 --> 0:06:21.400 Now Australia has sanctions against Russian ships and they're added 0:06:21.440 --> 0:06:23.840 to a number of Russian ships that might be transporting 0:06:23.920 --> 0:06:28.200 Russian oil. We also have a companion measure that is 0:06:28.240 --> 0:06:31.680 a Russian oil price cap, and we certainly know that 0:06:31.760 --> 0:06:35.720 Donald Trump doesn't like other countries buying Russian oil and 0:06:35.839 --> 0:06:37.880 is wanting to push that price down. So that is 0:06:37.920 --> 0:06:42.479 another mechanism, another announcement quietly made that won't displease the 0:06:42.480 --> 0:06:46.680 American president. I think what they're trying to do is 0:06:46.720 --> 0:06:49.200 to be seen to be a good ally, a good friend, 0:06:49.760 --> 0:06:54.280 but not shift Australian policy in response to pressure. From 0:06:54.279 --> 0:06:56.800 the United States, and it's quite a fine line to walk. 0:06:58.320 --> 0:07:01.440 Coming up advice for the prim Minister on how to 0:07:01.520 --> 0:07:11.720 handle the meeting. So, Karen, as you've said, the government 0:07:11.760 --> 0:07:15.440 has been working hard to please Trump ahead of finally 0:07:15.520 --> 0:07:19.920 securing this meeting, but on a number of matters Albanize 0:07:20.080 --> 0:07:23.320 has done the opposite. So there was the recognition of Palestine. 0:07:23.640 --> 0:07:27.960 There was his big speech about more regulation for tech companies. 0:07:28.000 --> 0:07:30.640 He also talked about climate change. So how do you 0:07:30.640 --> 0:07:33.560 think that Albenze is doing it trying to balance his 0:07:33.600 --> 0:07:37.520 own objectives and this need to have a good relationship 0:07:37.520 --> 0:07:40.040 with the US president when a lot of the time 0:07:40.160 --> 0:07:43.320 these two things are so diametrically opposed. 0:07:43.680 --> 0:07:47.160 Yes, And the tension here is because he's got a 0:07:47.160 --> 0:07:50.840 domestic audience and then he's got this international relationship that 0:07:50.960 --> 0:07:54.520 is important to Australia, and he knows that he has 0:07:54.600 --> 0:07:58.360 support from home for a lot of those measures, and 0:07:58.440 --> 0:08:04.080 support particularly for not bowing down to what Donald Trump wants, 0:08:03.800 --> 0:08:07.480 not changing Australia's positions because of Donald Trump. But he 0:08:07.520 --> 0:08:10.800 doesn't want to make him angry. He doesn't want to 0:08:10.960 --> 0:08:16.040 unnecessarily antagonize. So he's got to now find a way 0:08:16.240 --> 0:08:20.800 to forge a personal relationship and offer Donald Trump the 0:08:20.880 --> 0:08:24.320 positives in the relationship. Now we know that President Trump 0:08:24.360 --> 0:08:26.960 is a person who's looking for what the United States 0:08:26.960 --> 0:08:32.440 and what he personally can achieve from these relationships, and 0:08:32.480 --> 0:08:36.640 so Australia has to present the positive side, what orcast 0:08:36.720 --> 0:08:40.280 will mean for the US and what mutual benefit, as 0:08:40.280 --> 0:08:42.920 the governments would see it, those two countries can get 0:08:42.920 --> 0:08:47.240 out of that submarine impact. What Australia can offer things 0:08:47.400 --> 0:08:51.439 like you know, Australian superannuation funds and out going around 0:08:51.440 --> 0:08:53.920 the United States saying hey, we've got a two trillion 0:08:53.960 --> 0:08:56.960 dollar pot of money to invest in your country and 0:08:57.000 --> 0:09:00.160 you know, in good projects. So that's something that we'll 0:09:00.200 --> 0:09:04.120 appeal to the US president. And Australia has critical minerals 0:09:04.160 --> 0:09:06.840 to offer. So these are the kinds of things that 0:09:06.880 --> 0:09:10.840 Anthony Albanezi will now be presenting, not changing the Australian 0:09:10.840 --> 0:09:13.200 policy and having to defend it. And I think the 0:09:13.240 --> 0:09:15.800 suggestion is you do better as Donald Trump if you 0:09:15.840 --> 0:09:19.040 stick to your guns in a sense and don't be 0:09:19.120 --> 0:09:23.360 seen to be blown with the window or in weak 0:09:23.400 --> 0:09:26.040 in any way. But saying here, this is what I 0:09:26.080 --> 0:09:28.160 can offer you, this is what our country brings. This 0:09:28.200 --> 0:09:29.520 is why we can work well together. 0:09:30.600 --> 0:09:34.720 And Albanezi has so far rejected calls from within the 0:09:34.760 --> 0:09:38.640 Trump camp to replace Kevin Rudd as ambassador to the US. 0:09:38.800 --> 0:09:43.000 So tell me about what Rudd has been doing and 0:09:43.040 --> 0:09:44.640 how that's complicating the situation. 0:09:44.960 --> 0:09:47.280 Well, it is complicated. I mean, Kevin Rudd is a 0:09:47.280 --> 0:09:52.280 former Prime minister, so he has higher status as an ambassador. Unfortunately, though, 0:09:52.320 --> 0:09:54.839 there are key people in the Trump administration who don't 0:09:54.960 --> 0:09:58.440 like him. Kevin RhD had made some very forthright comments 0:09:58.440 --> 0:10:02.000 on social media before Donald Trump was a re elected 0:10:02.040 --> 0:10:04.520 president that were highly critical of him in it quite 0:10:04.559 --> 0:10:10.000 a personal way. Now they've been deleted, but they were noted, 0:10:10.240 --> 0:10:13.760 and these are the kinds of things that do anger 0:10:14.480 --> 0:10:17.840 some in the Trump administration and certainly President Trump himself. 0:10:18.720 --> 0:10:22.840 He has said in recent days how much he's not 0:10:22.880 --> 0:10:26.319 a forgiver of his opponents. He's a hater of his opponents, 0:10:26.360 --> 0:10:28.600 and he's not keen on working with people he doesn't like. 0:10:29.200 --> 0:10:32.400 So that makes it more complicated. When you talk to 0:10:32.400 --> 0:10:36.520 people familiar with how Australia is regarded in Washington, many 0:10:36.640 --> 0:10:39.600 many of them say Kevin Rud is highly regarded that 0:10:40.360 --> 0:10:42.640 some say they don't know that anyone else could have 0:10:42.640 --> 0:10:45.600 done a better job at trying to open doors for Australia. 0:10:45.720 --> 0:10:50.559 He's a globally recognized expert on China who speaks Mandarin. Obviously, 0:10:50.679 --> 0:10:53.480 the whole issue around China is the issue in the 0:10:53.520 --> 0:10:55.640 region that we live in at the moment in terms 0:10:55.679 --> 0:11:00.920 of security. So you know, he brings a lot to relationship, 0:11:00.920 --> 0:11:04.480 but there is this problem about whether they like him 0:11:04.520 --> 0:11:07.359 or not and whether that has made things slightly difficult. 0:11:08.240 --> 0:11:10.960 And so this meeting between Trump and Albanezi, it's just 0:11:11.000 --> 0:11:14.120 a few weeks away. What kind of advice do you 0:11:14.120 --> 0:11:17.360 think that the Prime Minister is fielding on how he 0:11:17.400 --> 0:11:18.200 should handle it? 0:11:18.400 --> 0:11:21.760 Well, I'm sure he's getting plenty of free advice privately, 0:11:21.800 --> 0:11:24.640 and he's certainly getting a lot publicly about how he 0:11:24.640 --> 0:11:28.680 should go about it. Anthony Alberanezi himself has said, you know, 0:11:28.920 --> 0:11:31.719 he's just going to be himself. That he likes to 0:11:31.760 --> 0:11:33.640 think he gets on well with people, he can find 0:11:33.640 --> 0:11:35.560 common ground, and that's what he'll be trying to do. 0:11:36.120 --> 0:11:40.319 Trump is notoriously unpredictable, though, So what do you think 0:11:40.600 --> 0:11:42.880 we should expect to come out of this? Is there 0:11:43.240 --> 0:11:47.040 any risk that we could see some kind of Zelenski 0:11:47.440 --> 0:11:50.720 like showdown. Do you think that Alberanezi would be worried 0:11:50.760 --> 0:11:51.839 about that possibility. 0:11:52.000 --> 0:11:54.560 Oh, I'm sure he's worried about that possibility. And I 0:11:54.559 --> 0:11:57.120 think there is always a risk because the President is 0:11:57.160 --> 0:12:00.440 nothing if not unpredictable, and we've certainly seen him him 0:12:00.880 --> 0:12:05.160 speak his mind in public to the discomfort of other 0:12:05.280 --> 0:12:08.160 leaders when it suits him. But we've also seen him 0:12:08.720 --> 0:12:12.640 get along with the leaders like so Kirstama in the UK, 0:12:13.280 --> 0:12:16.360 who is whose politics are more like Anthony Avenesi's, who 0:12:16.400 --> 0:12:19.800 also opposes a lot of Donald Trump's positions on big issues, 0:12:19.800 --> 0:12:21.960 but they seem to get on well. And we've seen 0:12:22.000 --> 0:12:26.120 in recent times that President Trump has changed his attitude 0:12:26.120 --> 0:12:30.080 to Volodimese Elenski from Ukraine. He's now saying Ukraine could 0:12:30.120 --> 0:12:31.680 be able to get all of its land back and 0:12:31.679 --> 0:12:34.360 that Russia's got to stop. So, you know, he's a 0:12:34.400 --> 0:12:40.080 mercurial person. He can be charming and also scathing, and 0:12:40.320 --> 0:12:42.679 Anthony Abnezi will be trying to get a little more 0:12:42.679 --> 0:12:45.480 of the former a little less of the latter, while 0:12:45.520 --> 0:12:48.920 also raising issues for Australia that are going to be difficult, 0:12:49.160 --> 0:12:53.680 like tariffs, and we've just seen huge tariffs now being 0:12:54.040 --> 0:12:58.560 announced for the pharmaceutical industry which would really impact Australian industry. 0:12:58.640 --> 0:13:01.640 So if Australia it might be able to dance around 0:13:01.640 --> 0:13:04.080 the tariff issue and not necessarily make a thing of 0:13:04.120 --> 0:13:07.680 it because we did reasonably well compared to other countries, 0:13:07.720 --> 0:13:10.600 we only getting a ten percent tariff, although we did 0:13:10.640 --> 0:13:13.520 get hit. We are getting hip of steel and aluminium terriffs. 0:13:14.000 --> 0:13:16.720 It's hard to avoid that issue now and Anthony Ovens 0:13:16.720 --> 0:13:18.760 he's going to have to focus a lot on how 0:13:18.760 --> 0:13:24.120 to manage that. And of course the real elephant in 0:13:24.160 --> 0:13:27.360 the room is the fact that Anthony Albaniz he've won 0:13:27.400 --> 0:13:33.040 an election by distancing himself from Donald Trump and highlighting 0:13:33.040 --> 0:13:36.319 the fact that his opponent was replicating Donald Trump's policies 0:13:36.400 --> 0:13:38.920 and his government was not. That's a bit hard to 0:13:38.960 --> 0:13:42.160 avoid and that's where we could run into problems and 0:13:42.200 --> 0:13:45.080 where it could get slightly awkward if Donald Trump decides 0:13:45.120 --> 0:13:46.000 to make an issue with it. 0:13:48.040 --> 0:13:59.160 Well, Karen, thank you so much for your time. Thanks Ruby. 0:14:03.559 --> 0:14:06.160 Also in the news, Donald Trump's use of the military 0:14:06.200 --> 0:14:09.000 on US soil is set to expand, with the President 0:14:09.080 --> 0:14:12.679 saying he plans to send troops to Portland, Oregon. Trump 0:14:12.720 --> 0:14:16.080 said immigration and customs enforcement facilities are under attack from 0:14:16.120 --> 0:14:20.600 Antifa and that he authorizes full force if necessary. Portland 0:14:20.640 --> 0:14:23.040 Mayor Keith Wilson rejected the claim and said there was 0:14:23.120 --> 0:14:25.960 no need for troops in his city. Portland is run 0:14:26.000 --> 0:14:28.480 by Democrats and is known as a sanctuary city, one 0:14:28.480 --> 0:14:32.520 that limits cooperation with federal immigration enforcement. Trump has now 0:14:32.520 --> 0:14:34.760 approved the use of the military to deal with domestic 0:14:34.800 --> 0:14:39.520 issues in Memphis, Washington, d C. And Los Angeles. And 0:14:39.640 --> 0:14:42.560 Anthony Alberonezi has ruled out a referendum to make Australia 0:14:42.600 --> 0:14:45.760 a republic while he is Prime Minister, despite being in 0:14:45.760 --> 0:14:48.200 favor of an Australian head of state. The Prime Minister 0:14:48.320 --> 0:14:50.720 reaffirmed his position on Sunday that there would only be 0:14:50.760 --> 0:14:53.400 one referendum during his time at leading the country, the 0:14:53.480 --> 0:14:57.000 Voice referendum in twenty twenty three. Speaking on the ABC's 0:14:57.040 --> 0:15:00.480 Insiders program after meeting King Charles at Balmoral, he said, 0:15:00.480 --> 0:15:02.440 while they did not discuss it, the King is aware 0:15:02.480 --> 0:15:06.320 he's in favor of Australia becoming a republic. I'm Ruby Jones. 0:15:06.360 --> 0:15:08.040 This is seven AM. Thanks for listening.