‘A tax on Bluey’: Rudd mocks Trump’s movie tariffs

Australia’s ambassador to the United States, Kevin Rudd, ridiculed President Donald Trump’s proposed movie tariffs at a high-powered executive conference in Los Angeles and reminded business leaders that Trump tried to place import taxes on uninhabited islands.

“I don’t think we want to see a tax on Bluey,” Rudd said, referring to the ABC children’s program that became a worldwide hit.

Australian ambassador to the United States Kevin Rudd at the Milken Institute Global Conference in Los Angeles.Credit: Milken Institute

“What happens if we all lock down our countries with competitive, punitive arrangements against each other’s movies? Movies are the way in which we kind of understand each other more. So I’d be all for opening this up.”

Trump announced this week he was planning to impose a 100 per cent tariff on all films made overseas as a means of shoring up the US film and television industry.

It was not clear how the tariffs would work given the global filming and distribution of content for movies and streaming services. The White House noted the following day that “no final decisions have been made”.

Rudd went on to mock the Trump administration’s imposition of 10 per cent tariffs on the uninhabited Heard and McDonald Islands as part of his “Liberation Day” tariff announcement.

“If you’ve seen the other great Australian movie, Happy Feet – you know, the penguins – those penguins of ours have just been tariffed down in Heard and Macquarie [sic] Island in Antarctica,” he said.

“They’re producing a sequel, it’s called Unhappy Feet. There’ll be a march of penguins on Washington.”

The former prime minister made the comments at the Milken Institute’s Global Conference in Los Angeles, an annual gathering of the world’s business and political elite that also attracted the likes of Elon Musk, billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman and several members of Trump’s economic team.

Rudd has had to walk a tightrope in his relationship with Trump and the new administration, having called the now president a “traitor to the west” and the “most destructive president in history” in now-deleted social media posts.

Talking on same LA panel, Britain’s ambassador to the US, Peter Mandelson, said he wanted greater cultural and sporting investment between the US and UK, and his ambition was for Britain to host the NFL Super Bowl.

“We’re not very keen on tariffs on cars. Nor are we terribly keen on tariffs on films, amongst the best of which are now made in Britain,” he said.

Rudd’s remarks reflect a greater willingness by Australian government figures to criticise Trump’s tariffs at home and abroad.

NSW Premier Chris Minns – whose state has recently attracted big Hollywood productions to film there – said it was a “terrible decision” to try to tariff films.

“I don’t know how long Trump’s going to be around, I don’t know how long common sense will be suspended in America, but if the industry collapses in the meantime, it’s very hard to resurrect it from scratch,” Minns said.

“It’s a massive shame, a real kick in the guts to a great industry. The madness coming out of the United States, surely it can’t stick around forever. Ultimately, either this administration will pass or common sense will prevail.”

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese spoke about tariffs and AUKUS with Trump on Monday but did not divulge details of the conversation. He said they would have further discussions in person, likely at the G7 in Canada next month, which Albanese will attend as an invited guest.

Justin Wolfers, an Australian economics professor at the University of Michigan, said Trump’s proposed tariffs on films were a “f---ing stupid” thought bubble, although “it’s not the first idea he’s had that met that criteria that ultimately became policy”.

Movie tariffs were not as unfeasible as some people claimed, Wolfers said, but were less straightforward than import duties on goods.

US President Donald Trump in the Oval Office on Wednesday.Credit: Bloomberg

“If you can tax it, you can tariff it, and we can tax anything,” he said. “[But] this is a White House where no one likes to do their homework. It would require a proper process to figure out how to do this.”

Meanwhile, the US Federal Reserve left interest rates steady on Wednesday (Thursday AEST) despite Trump’s demands for a cut.

Chairman Jerome Powell, whom Trump has personally targeted, said while the underlying inflation picture in the US was positive, uncertainty caused in large part by Trump’s tariffs meant that leaving rates on hold was the more prudent course.

“There’s just so much that we don’t know. The costs of waiting to see further are fairly low, we think, so that’s what we’re doing,” Powell said. “We don’t feel like we need to be in a hurry, we think it’s appropriate to be patient.”

Trump has repeatedly criticised Powell for being “too slow” to lower interest rates, but recently backed away from threats to sack him, a move that would likely be challenged in the Supreme Court.

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