Media
|
Transcripts
July 11, 2025
MONIQUE WRIGHT: It has been revealed that Kevin Rudd, our ambassador to the U.S., had held a pull-aside meeting with Donald Trump at his golf course back in January, which was just days before he was inaugurated as president. The Coalition has demanded more detail about what was discussed between the pair, accusing the government of being, quote, secretive over what transpired. For more, we're joined now by James Paterson, who is the Shadow Finance Minister, live in Melbourne. Good morning to you, James. Thanks for being with us. So the Coalition is accusing the government of being secretive here. What more do you want to know about what happened at this pull-aside meeting?
SENATOR JAMES PATERSON: Well, just a little bit of detail for your viewers, Mon. In January this year, the Prime Minister mentioned casually in the middle of a radio interview that Kevin Rudd had met with the President. And this is important because it's now 248 days since the President was elected. And as far as we know, Kevin is the only Australian who's met with him. So in February at Senate estimates, I asked a series of questions to officials in the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, like; Where was this meeting? When was this meeting? How long did it go for? What were the outcomes? What was discussed? And over 17 excruciating minutes, they squirmed and obfuscated and refused to give me any information at all. Now, four months on, in a written question on notice, they provided three sentences of information, just confirming that the meeting took place and that it was at Trump's golf course, but nothing else. We need to know, was AUKUS discussed? Was the trading relationship discussed? Was a meeting with the Prime Minister planned? None of that detail has been provided.
MONIQUE WRIGHT: Okay, it's a positive sign, though, James, isn't it? Isn't it in Australia's best interest that a meeting between Donald Trump and Anthony Albanese happens here? Do we really need to know every last detail of this diplomatic channel?
SENATOR JAMES PATERSON: It's certainly in Australia's national interest that the Prime Minister meet the President, and we have been urging him to do so for seven months now, and he's ignored our advice. And it's hopefully good news that Kevin Rudd met with him in January, but actually, we don't know. Was this a meeting that went for 30 seconds or 30 minutes? Did it go well, or did it go badly? Have there been any subsequent conversations or meetings between the Ambassador and the President? Has the Ambassador even had a meeting at the White House? We don't know any of this information. This is our most important relationship, at our most critical time in history, and we need more transparency.
MONIQUE WRIGHT: Do you see that asking those questions and the answers to those questions will help the Prime Minister get a meeting with Donald Trump, which is in Australia's best interest?
SENATOR JAMES PATERSON: Well, it is the job of an opposition in a democracy to ask questions of the government. And it's particularly important that we ask questions about Kevin Rudd's performance as Ambassador to the United States because he has said many critical things of Donald Trump in the past on the public record, and the Prime Minister still chose to send him to the US to represent our interests. So if it's not working, then we need to know. We need to know so that a change can be made in Australia's national interest, so that we can have someone there who can effectively represent our interests because we've got enormous issues at stake with the Americans, including the AUKUS submarines pact, but also our trading relationship. We could have tariffs applied to our $3 billion pharmaceutical export sector any day now, and we still don't know where we stand on that.
MONIQUE WRIGHT: Yep, alright. James Paterson, Shadow Finance Minister, we really appreciate your time this morning. Thank you.
SENATOR JAMES PATERSON: Thanks, Mon, cheers.
ENDS