What’s a few barbs between allies? They seem to be doing their jobs in Washington DC just fine.
Thu 23 Oct 2025 09.00
Photo: AAP Image/Lukas Coch
What’s a few barbs between allies?
Kevin Rudd, Australia’s Ambassador to the United States of America, was personally scorned by President Donald Trump at a White House press conference earlier this week. “I don’t like you,” Mr Trump bluntly told Mr Rudd, apparently in reference to critical comments about the president that Mr Rudd made years ago. But there are people much closer to Mr Trump who have said things much worse about the man; they seem to be doing their jobs in Washington D.C. just fine. Here are some examples.
I go back and forth between thinking […] he’s America’s Hitler”
– JD Vance, appointed by Mr Trump to Vice President.
Photo: Official White House Photo/Daniel Torok
As Mr Trump became the Republican Party’s presidential hopeful in 2016, a young venture capitalist named JD Vance messaged his friend: “I go back and forth between thinking Trump is a cynical asshole like Nixon who wouldn’t be that bad (and might even prove useful) or that he’s America’s Hitler.” The friend saved the message.
Mr Vance received Mr Trump’s endorsement as the Republican senate candidate for Ohio in 2022 (he had at some point converted to Trumpian Republicanism). At the time, the president clearly didn’t know much about JD Vance, struggling to remember his endorsee: “JP, right? JD Mandel.” Josh Mandel was Mr Vance’s rival in that race.
In 2024, Mr Vance became Mr Trump’s running mate for Vice President.
A con artist […] he has spent his entire career sticking it to the little guy”
– Marco Rubio, appointed by Mr Trump to Secretary of State.
Photo: Official White House Photo/Molly Riley
During the 2016 Republican presidential primary that saw Mr Trump ascend to the White House for the first time, the US Senator from Florida called him a “con artist”. Mr Rubio was punching back against Mr Trump’s personal attacks on him, only to provoke further insults from Mr Trump. Days later, Mr Rubio played into the testosterone-filled political culture of America’s right wing by mocking the size of Mr Trump’s hands: “Have you seen his hands? And you know what they say about men with small hands…”
Eight years later, Mr Rubio kissed the ring on those small hands; he now serves as the Secretary of State in the second Trump Administration.
He’s turning America into a petrostate”
– Robert F. Kennedy Jr., appointed by Mr Trump to Secretary of Health.
Photo: Official White House Photo/Joyce N. Boghosian
In 2017, when RFK Jr. was still known more as an environmental activist than a health nut, he expressed dismay that Mr Trump had “turned the nation over to coal and oil interests.” He said Mr Trump, who was weeks into his first presidency, was turning the country into a petrostate by having “the most notorious oil man in the country to run the State Department”.
Mr Trump would appoint Mr Kennedy to run America’s Department of Health eight years later.
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Saudi Arabia’s bitch”
– Tulsi Gabbard, appointed by Mr Trump to Director of National Intelligence.
Photo: Official White House Photo/Molly Riley
Tulsi Gabbard was a Democratic-party Congresswoman representing Hawai’i when she lambasted the president on Twitter: “Hey @realdonaldtrump: being Saudi Arabia’s bitch is not ‘America First.’”
This came in response to the Trump White House’s refusal to take action against the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in a Saudi embassy in Istanbul in 2018. Mr Khashoggi was a Saudi citizen with legal residency in America entitled to US protection. Though American intelligence’s assessment suggested that the Saudi Government had ordered the assassination of their critic, Mr Trump brushed it aside as he defended US-Saudi relations.
Ms Gabbard, a US Army veteran, again criticised Mr Trump in 2020 after the Trump administration assassinated a top Iranian military commander, Qasem Soleimani. She said the president has “no justification whatsoever for this illegal and unconstitutional act of war.”
She now serves as the second Trump Administration’s Director of National Intelligence.
What former President Trump did to undermine faith in our election system and disrupt the peaceful transfer of power is inexcusable.”
– John Thune, elected by Republicans as Senate Majority Leader.
Photo: Gage Skidmore on Flickr
In February 2021, as the US Capitol was still reeling from the January 6 Attack, in which Trump supporters sought to overturn the presidential election result, Republican Senator John Thune declared that Mr Trump’s actions were “inexcusable”.
This came even as Mr Thune voted to acquit Mr Trump over his alleged incitement of the insurrection, which Mr Thune explained away by saying that the senate should not punish someone who was now a private citizen.
Mr Thune already had a history criticising Mr Trump, in the weeks before the election 2016, when he called for Mr Trump to withdraw from the presidential campaign, after a recording surfaced of Mr Trump boasting about his sexual advances towards women.
This didn’t prevent Mr Thune from endorsing Mr Trump during the 2024 Republican presidential primaries. Mr Thune was then elected the leader of the Republicans in the Senate, where he commands a thin majority and works hand in glove with the president.
None of these people have stopped doing their job because of past criticism of President Trump, so why should Australia’s ambassador?
This is part of America’s long-standing grudge against Australia’s Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS).
The global economic outlook remains “dim” as President Donald Trump’s tariff chaos continues to cloud financial forecasts.
Dr Navi Pillay has expressed concern about a lack of accountability for genocide in Gaza.
“Success” in a meeting with Trump is to avoid the ritual humiliation the president sometimes likes to inflict on his interlocutors. In that sense, Albanese and his team pulled off an impressive diplomatic feat.
