Foreign Minister Penny Wong and Defence Minister Richard Marles have met Donald Trump’s former top diplomat to shore up ties with the former president ahead of a close and bitterly contested US election.

The previously undisclosed meeting with Mike Pompeo, a conservative who is touted as a senior figure in another Trump administration, is part of an effort spearheaded by US ambassador Kevin Rudd to cultivate relationships with Trump’s allies, and those of his Democratic rival Kamala Harris.