Anthony Albanese smacks down calls to fire Kevin Rudd over awkward Trump video

Anthony Albanese has rejected calls to fire Kevin Rudd, after revelations he previously called the US President-elect a “village idiot”.

Anthony Albanese has emphatically declared Kevin Rudd is the right man to lead our diplomatic efforts in the United States after revelations he previously called the US President-elect a “village idiot”.

Just days after Mr Rudd moved to clean up his comments on social media where he described Mr Trump as “the most destructive president in history”, another spray has come back to haunt him. Sky News’ Sharri Markson revealed the footage on Monday night, which showsMr Rudd speaking in a webinar with Dr Shashi Tharoor, an Indian politician and former diplomat.

“The United States, in the past four years, has been run by a village idiot,” Mr Rudd said in the unearthed footage.

“People have seen China continuing to be competent in its national statecraft and the United States increasingly incompetent in its national statecraft under Trump.”

At a press conference in Tasmania, the Prime Minister smacked down calls to sack his former Labor colleague.

When asked whether Mr Rudd was the “right person” to continue as Ambassador to the US, Mr Albanese responded: “Yes.”

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has smacked down calls to sack Kevin Rudd as US Ambassador. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Martin Ollman

Kevin Rudd called Donald Trump a ‘village idiot’ and ‘incoherent’ in newly unearthed footage. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Martin Ollman

Mr Rudd previously described the President-elect as a ‘political liability’. Picture: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images/AFP

Mr Albanese also rubbished opposition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham’s calls for the PM to seek a meeting with Mr Trump in Florida at the end of a scheduled G20 summit in Brazil next week.

“If you have a look at the map, it’s actually not on the way,” Mr Albanese told reporters.

“Simon Birmingham does two things. One, he says I do too many trips. And secondly, he says I should do more.

“Simon Birmingham is someone who never has much constructive to say at all. I had a really constructive discussion with President-elect Trump last week. It was a very good beginning to our relationship.

“We support trade and I know that the US has a trade surplus with Australia.

“It is in the United States’ interest and also Australia’s interest for there to continue to be trade between our two great nations and I’m confident that that will continue to occur.”

Mr Rudd and Mr Albanese at an event in Washington DC. Picture: Twitter

Liberal leader Peter Dutton is urging the Albanese Government “read the room” after the US election and work “with and not against our most important ally”.

“When we were in government we were able to negotiate with the Trump administration and exemption from tariffs that were being applied at that time,” he said.

“The onus will be on the prime minister to negotiate a similar outcome with the Trump administration and that will be a question for him as to whether or not they are able to craft that.

“But I think it is obvious America has charted a different course now and the government here needs to course correct and make sure they are working with and not against our most important ally. The prime minister says that we live in the most precarious period since the Second World War, but we need to have a very strong and trusted relationship with our Five Eyes partners including the United States.”

Mr Dutton said the clear message of the US election is that “families in the US are hurting under higher inflation and unsurprisingly, that is exactly what is happening in our country”.

“Secondly, incumbent governments that do not read the room and do not understand the priorities that people have will be punished for it,” he said.

“And the Albanese government has got themselves into all sorts of problems and a muddle at the moment because they have made bad decisions early in this term.”

Liberal leader Peter Dutton is urging the Albanese Government ‘read the room’ after the US election and work ‘with and not against our most important ally’. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Linda Higginson

Prior to his appointment as Australia’s ambassador to the United States, Mr Rudd also described Mr Trump as a “political liability”, a “problem for the world” and a “traitor to the west”.

In June 2021, Mr Rudd mocked Mr Trump’s distinctive style with a Mar-a-Lago joke during a speech at the Harvard Asia Centre and quipping he could add it as a subtitle to a 2015 paper he authored on US-China relations.

“I hope to publish again soon, hopefully early next year. The future of US China relations under President Trump and the subtitle will be a call for a new tremendous piece of very big, beautiful Mar-a-Lago chocolate cake,” Mr Rudd joked to applause from the Harvard Asia Centre crowd.

“That’s the working title. Any other suggestions, I’ll greatly receive. But I think it’s innovative and tasty. Tremendously tasty.”

Mr Rudd also attended a political science webinar at Duke University in 2022 and described the president-elect as “incoherent” and occasionally “in love with dictators”.

“Donald Trump had a habit of wanting to shred most of the allies in terms of their political standing and cause doubted uncertainty as to whether he’d actually have their back if a crisis emerged,” he said.

“But the underpinnings of (the trans-Pacific Partnership) was still incoherent because Trump himself was incoherent, and he waxed and waned from being in love with dictators to not knowing what he wanted from dictators.”

Prior to his appointment as Australia’s ambassador to the United States, Mr Rudd also described Mr Trump as a ‘political liability’. Picture: Alex Wong/Getty Images/AFP

At an address to the Oxford Union in 2017, Rudd said of then-President Trump he was a “problem” for Australia and the world.

“Trump at present represents a political liability for both sides of Australian politics,” Mr Rudd said.

“This guy is a problem. He is an objective problem, for the world, for the region, for my country.”

Last week it was revealed that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who appointed Mr Rudd to the Washington post, had previously been caught on tape saying that Mr Trump’s presidency “scared the sh*t out of me”.

“We have an alliance with the US, we’ve got to deal with him, but that doesn’t mean that you’re uncritical about it,” Mr Albanese said in 2017.

“He scares the sh*t out of me, and I think it’s of some concern the leader of the free world thinks that you can conduct politics through 140 characters on Twitter overnight.”

Mr Trump’s daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, suggested it was ‘hard’ to keep someone in a diplomatic position who had said ‘such nasty things about a person’. Picture: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images/AFP

Mr Trump was previously asked about Mr Rudd’s comments in a British TV interview in March, suggesting that the former Australian PM turned diplomat was “not the brightest bulb” and “nasty”.

“He won’t be there long if that’s the case,” Mr Trump said.

In an interview with Sky News Australia days before the election, the President-elect’s daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, who also serves as the co-chair of the Republican National Committee, suggest it was “hard” to keep someone in a diplomatic position who had said “such nasty things about a person”.

“I do think it would be nice to have a person who appreciates all that Donald Trump has gone through to want to serve our country at this moment.”

Originally published as Anthony Albanese smacks down calls to fire Kevin Rudd over awkward Trump video