Albanese visits Trump as US democracy circles a golden drain

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s meeting with US President Donald Trump has been hailed a diplomatic success but critics argue it’s exposed Canberra’s quiet complicity as the US administration continues its march towards an increasingly authoritarian regime.

The Prime Minister emerged from the highly publicised meeting at the White House unscathed; a feat many now regard as the hallmark of a “successful” diplomatic engagement.

“It’s a pretty low bar,” said Deputy Director Ebony Bennett on a special crossover episode of the Australia Institute’s podcasts Follow the Money and After America.

“Meetings with Trump can go so incredibly badly,” agreed Dr Emma Shortis, Director of International & Security Affairs at the Australia Institute. “They can be volatile and unpredictable. They can be humiliating and none of that really happened and that’s hard to do.”

There was one awkward interaction that captured media attention when President Trump was asked about previous negative comments made by Kevin Rudd, Australia’s Ambassador to the US.

“I don’t like you either,” Mr Trump told Mr Rudd, “And I probably never will”.

“That could have gone off the rails really quickly and he made sure that it didn’t. Full credit to them in that sense,” said Dr Shortis.

“However, I would also say that that’s a fairly narrow way of measuring success. We tend to measure success in Australian diplomacy as something going very smoothly and nothing really changing.”

Mr Rudd sought out President Trump once the cameras stopped rolling to apologise for the remarks he made last year which included calling Mr Trump a “village idiot” and “incoherent”.

“Rudd was rightly identifying Trump as a threat to American democracy,” said Dr Shortis, “and in that stance, standing up for the shared values our relationship with the United States is supposedly based on.

“He was not inaccurate in that assessment,” agreed Ms Bennett.

“Australians should be proud that their ambassador was standing up for the principles of democracy and was concerned about the threat that Trump posed to American democracy,” said Dr Shortis.

Opposition Leader Sussan Ley immediately called for Kevin Rudd to be sacked, calling his position “untenable”, however, she has since backtracked on the remarks.

“This idea that we should be handing an ambassadorship over to someone who’s kind of closer to the MAGA movement … that just seems ridiculous to me,” said Ms Bennett.

Dr Shortis said the idea “falls into this trap of thinking, we have to cosy up to Trump no matter what, no matter he does, you have to put somebody in that position, an American fascist likes and gets along with.”

“It appears Rudd has done his job and done it very effectively in making sure that this meeting went smoothly, in doing the work around this critical minerals deal, in doing the work around AUKUS confirmation, as its being described.”

Dr Shortis believed the meeting was more show than substance, pointing to President Trump’s comments about the $368 billion AUKUS nuclear-submarine deal which the Pentagon is still reviewing.

“I think it’s moving along very rapidly, very well,” said Mr Trump.

When asked to guarantee Australia would receive the nuclear-powered submarines he replied, “Oh it’s getting, they’re getting them.”

“This is the wild thing,” said the Australia Institute’s Dr Emma Shortis, “We are apparently just taking Trump’s word for it.

“We’re supposed to just believe that. It’s wild to me that so much media coverage treats Trump with so much credulity.

“It doesn’t matter what Trump promises. The fact that the US ship building industry can’t meet its own requirements hasn’t changed. Trump can’t magic that away.”

“So, in a way, nothing really to report on the AUKUS end of things. Situation normal,” said Ms Bennett.

The $13 billion rare earth and critical minerals deal between Australia and the United States has also been lauded a diplomatic success for the Prime Minister, as the western countries attempt to disrupt China’s dominance in the global supply chain.

“But again, the devil is in the detail with all of these things,” said Dr Shortis.

“It’s being hailed as confirmation the United States still cares about us and still needs us,” she noted, “and is certainly being framed in that usual, great power competition way, around Australia and the United States needing access to critical minerals and needing to make sure that China, in particular doesn’t have a monopoly on the supply”.

Experts fear that kind posturing risks drawing Australia into quiet complicitly with President Trump’s volatile and increasingly authoritarian regime.

“It’s deeply shocking to see the way in which and how fast this Trump administration has been able to dismantle US democracy,” said Ebony Bennett.

Dr Shortis agreed. “It is so striking how much of Australian foreign policy is driven by habit. To hear the Prime Minister say, standing side by side for freedom and democracy in the white House when President Trump is, literally on the same day, having part of the East Wing of the White House demolished so that he can build his $200 million ballroom.

“He’s demolishing the people’s house that doesn’t belong to him.”

And all the while the US Government remains in shutdown.