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RUBY:

From Schwartz Media, I’m Ruby Jones, this is 7am.

When Malcolm Turnbull was prime minister, he made a call that made the then-president of the United States very, very angry.

Donald Trump called it the “worst call he’d had all day” – a “killer”, “crazy” and “disgusting”.

But Turnbull argues that making Trump mad, and saying things he didn’t want to hear, is the only way to deal with him.

Now, as Australia faces the prospect of a second Trump term, Turnbull says our Prime Minister’s willingness to face off with the President could make the difference on everything from the economy, to our security.

Today, former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull on how he forged a relationship with Donald Trump and what Anthony Albanese needs to know if Trump wins again.

It’s Tuesday October 22.

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RUBY:

So, Malcolm, as we speak, there are just 15 days to the US election. There is every chance that we will see a returning President Trump. When he came to power the first time. So in 2016, you were the prime minister. Tell me about your very first conversation with him.

MALCOLM:

Well, the first substantive conversation I had with him was a blazing row. And that was in shortly after he'd been inaugurated in January 2017. And he was in a towering rage because well, I mean, the issue was the deal I'd done with Barack Obama to resettle in the United States a number of people who had been detained on Manus Island and Nauru.

We had every indication that that deal was going to continue to be honoured. But then shortly before the call, Mike Pence rang Julie Bishop and General Flynn rang Justin Bassi, who was my national security adviser in my office, and said, the deal's off. Prime Minister shouldn't raise with the president. He's not going to do it. It's over.

Anyway, I did raise it, and I insisted that the United States should honour it. And Trump was furious about it and, you know, raged and raved and much of the transcript is in the public domain. It was leaked at some point by someone in the White House, I assume, to The Washington Post.

Audio Excerpt - Donald Trump:

“We had one instance in Australia, I have a lot of respect for Australia, love Australia as a country but we had a problem.”

MALCOLM:

But so it was one of those furious conversations that started off with no way Jose and ended up with yes, but I hate you. He actually said it was the worst call he'd had all day.

Audio Excerpt - Donald Trump:

“And i said why? Why are we doing this? What’s the purpose? So we’ll see what happens but the previous administration does something. You have to respect that, but you can also say, why are we doing this?”

MALCOLM:

My proposition was we have a deal. You're like a new CEO. You take over the company. You think your predecessor has done some dud deals, you can complain about them. But you've got to honour them. And so my proposition simply was America's word should be its bond. Simple as that.

RUBY:

As he became angrier on that call, did you at any point doubt that that was the right approach?

MALCOLM:

No, I never had any doubt it was the right approach. I wasn't sure that, I wasn't sure that we we'd get to a yes, because he, he was pretty pissed off, to say the least. But the reality is if you give in to bullies, you just get more bullying.

RUBY:

And so this negotiation over the resettling of asylum seekers to the U.S. is not the only time that you dealt with Trump.

MALCOLM:

Oh sure.

RUBY:

Can you tell me a bit more about what you've seen up close in person with him that you think that the public or the media miss when it comes to the way that he thinks about power?

MALCOLM:

With Trump, what you see is what you get. You know, I mean, he's is a guy that says the quiet bits out loud. The problem is that most people are scared of him. Right. you know, the advice from, you know, all of the wannabe Trump whisperers, most of whom have no real insight or experience at all I might add. Is oh, you know, flatter him, talk about golf, suck up to him, you know, all this stuff. And that way you won't get what you want. I mean, you, you'll get what he wants. Now, the critical thing is to be prepared to stand up to him, but also to recognise that he can be intelligently transactional.

The other big issue he had, the only other contentious issue we had during my time, was when Trump was seeking to impose the very big tariffs, 25% tariffs on steel imports and 10% tariffs on aluminium imports. Now Australia does export steel and aluminium to the United States. And I was very concerned that those tariffs not apply to us.

Now there of course, I didn't have the ability to say, well, I've got a done deal. You've got to stick to it. I had to persuade him. Now the thing about Trump is the only decision maker in the Trump White House was Donald Trump. So, you know, ambassadors and officials and advisers are much less relevant than they are in a more conventional administration.

You know, in the case of the tariffs, Trump's advisers were all against doing the deal that I wanted to do with him, but I managed to persuade him that it was in his interest, not to impose those tariffs on Australia. A very intelligent, rational, transactional discussion. I mean, that was certainly wasn't, you know, making a big issue out of 100 years of mateship. And all of the sentimental stuff that people always talk about on public occasions. It was very much a business discussion about numbers and economics. And he was intelligently transactional be the best way I could describe it.

RUBY:

It seems like he was also aware that you had at one point represented someone who he considered a friend, Kerry Packer. Do you think that that had anything to do with it?

MALCOLM:

Well, I'd never dealt with him. He'd never dealt with me. But he knew a bit about me by reputation or so he said. In fact, every time I met him, pretty much he said to somebody who was there, you know, Malcolm's the best lawyer in the world. He kept my friend Kerry Packer out of jail. It became a bit of a shtick, actually, to be honest. He's a performer. And I would say, Well, very kind, Donald. But you know, Kerry was innocent, to which he would say, oh no, he was as he was so guilty, deserved to go to jail forever, you know. I'm sure he didn't believe that. But but it was just it became a routine. But I think, you know, I think I had a reputation for being a tough negotiator, good lawyer. None of that hurt.

RUBY:

And when you say, though, that, you know, Trump was willing to do deals that were in his interest, I mean, how key is that in dealing with Trump?

MALCOLM:

Totally. I mean, if you wanted to get a deal done with Trump, you've got to persuade him that it's in his interest to do the deal. I mean, this is not a sentimental guy, right? What's his slogan? America First. And that means Donald Trump first.

RUBY:

Coming up after the break - What “Donald Trump first” means for Australia’s security.

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RUBY:

So Malcolm, how do you think a second Trump presidency would differ from the first?

MALCOLM:

Well, he’ll be much better organised. He didn't expect to win last time. He's now got a lot of people who want to execute a very radical agenda. He will still be the, you know, chaotic, erratic personality he is. I mean you've only got to listen to one of his speeches to see what he's like. But the fact is he will hit the ground running and he will believe that he can walk on water. If he wins and, you know, many people think he will, it will be one of the biggest political comebacks ever.

I think globally, he wants to impose a big tariff. it's started up at ten. He's talking about a 20% tariff on all imports into the United States. That is going to put a brake on trade, an even higher tariff, 60% tariff on all imports from China.

In terms of our region and China, Taiwan, for example, whereas Biden has said he would, you know, America would defend Taiwan. Trump has not said anything of the sort, in fact, he questioned why America would.

Audio Excerpt - News Host:

“Should the US help defend Taiwan if it means going to war with China?”

Audio Excerpt - Donald Trump:

“Well I don’t want to say it because if I’m in the position of president, I don’t wanna say what I’m thinking, you know, if I just answer that question, it will put me in a very bad negotiating position.”

MALCOLM:

There's a lot of mixed messages there, But the big message for us is that we have the only people we can really count on to defend Australia are ourselves, you know, we had a program to build submarines in Australia ourselves. Morrison cancelled that in favour of the AUKUS plan. Albanese has gone along with that. It now looks more likely than not that we'll never get any submarines at all, certainly won't get any American submarines, yet we're providing the Americans with a big submarine base. Maybe, is that a good thing? I guess it's a good thing.

But what that means is the critical decisions about Australia's defence are not being taken in Canberra, they're being taken in Washington, you know, and we've effectively had a over the Morrison and Albanese Government's a very significant diminution in our sovereignty and autonomy right at the time when we need it most.

RUBY:

What do you suggest can be done then, though? Because, I mean, maybe AUKUS is a bad deal, but it is a done deal, so, you know, we're stuck with it. So when you say Australia.

MALCOLM:

The deal with France was a done deal, right?

RUBY:

When you say that we need to put ourselves first, Australia needs to put itself first, what does that actually mean?

MALCOLM:

Well, I think I think for a start. I think well what it means is we've got to be able to have the capabilities to defend Australia, which are genuinely sovereign. That is to say, they can be sustained, maintained and directed by Australia. That's what we need.

We find out much more about what's going on with AUKUS, out of releases in Washington than we ever do from what's said in Canberra. You know, we're just and you know, part of the problem, of course, is that it's a Coalition policy the Labor Party adopted. So when both sides of politics, you know, agree on something, then who's holding them to account?

RUBY:

And what about Donald Trump's influence on Australian political life? I mean, in particular Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has been accused of, of weaponizing division in a similar way to Trump, particularly when it comes to something like immigration policy. So do you see shades of Trump's political rhetoric in your former party?

MALCOLM:

Well, look, people have been weaponizing immigration issues in Australian politics for well over 100 years. I don't think Peter Dutton stumbled on something new. But the Trump populist style has got a lot of imitators around the world. You know, you see them in Europe, you see them, you know, Bolsonaro in Brazil. And of course, Trump is operating nowadays in a right wing media ecosystem, of which the Murdoch media is probably the largest single part, not the only part. But, Fox News, Sky News in Australia, Murdoch tabloids, very, very similar playbook. And so Trumpy tactics and rhetoric and so forth are being copied right around the world and they admire him because he's able to get away with it.

RUBY:

It sounds like you have dealt with Trump successfully as prime minister. As you say, it's all about the personal relationship, the one on one. Would you be up for being an ambassador?

MALCOLM:

No, no, no. I'm very happy out of the public sector. The ambassador's role is important. Right. And, you know, Joe did a good job and Arthur Sinodinos did a good job. And Kevin's doing a great job. But with Trump in particular, the only relationship that matters is going to be between the Australian prime minister and the American president.

So our prime minister has got to have the confidence and the character and the courage to deal with Trump, because all Trump will respect is strength and conviction.

RUBY:

Malcolm, thank you so much for your time.

MALCOLM:

Thank you.

RUBY:

Malcolm Turnbull’s essay “Second Coming: How to Deal with Trump” is out now in Australian Foreign Affairs.

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RUBY:

Also in the news today,

King Charles and Queen Camilla have received a ceremonial welcome on their visit to Canberra.

After the King’s speech in the great hall yesterday, senator Lidia Thorpe called out “you are not our king… you are not sovereign…"

Audio Excerpt - Lidia Thorpe:

“You are not our king, you are not sovereign, you committed genocide against, our people give us our land back.”

Before being escorted away. Earlier, Senator Thorpe turned her back as God Save the King was played.

And, the federal court has ruled that Hundreds of former Qantas workers who were illegally sacked in 2020 will receive financial compensation from the airline.

Last year Qantas was found to have broken the law when it stood down 17-hundred ground crew members in 2020.

Lawyers for Qantas and the Transport Workers’ Union will now attend mediation to determine the final compensation payout for workers.

And if you haven’t yet, you should listen to our new series This is Alice Springs. It’s hosted by my colleague Daniel James, and it’s extraordinary. It’s in our feed now.

I’m Ruby Jones, this is 7am. Thanks for listening.

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