Donald Trump has crashed into the Australian election campaign, forcing Anthony Albanese to prepare for harmful tariffs and Peter Dutton to reassess his political strategy.
The US President’s “Liberation Day” tariffs on Australian goods, and the Prime Minister’s reaction to them, will dominate the last days of the first week of the election campaign, with the Opposition Leader wedged between attacking Trump and blaming Albanese.
After a slow start to the election campaign and the vow that “you haven’t seen anything yet”, Dutton was already in danger of losing momentum at a time when Albanese was targeting him and the Reserve Bank’s decision on interest rates. Trump’s tariffs threaten to further smother the Liberal message.
Dutton is going to have to look at some way to change the conversation, and it looks as if it might be national security and the threat of China.
Albanese, unable to get tariff exemptions for Australia, has sought to tie Dutton to Trump’s agenda on cutting services, sacking public servants and accusing him of “praising President Trump” as the Liberal leader accuses Albanese lacking the “backbone” to stand up to the great disruptor.
So far the US President has not turned his full attention to Australia, but Trump’s ability to disrupt the politics of allies and friends is in the mind of both leaders. After weeks of linking Dutton to Trump, Albanese said on Monday: “He thinks this is a contest of who can say the most aggro things. It’s not. That’s not the way diplomacy works … This guy has no experience in international relations”.
Dutton declared that Trump “has been able to stand all over” Albanese, that the PM was “flapping in the breeze” and that he would “stand up to Trump”.
Both leaders are well aware that Trump’s interventions can drastically change the course of campaigns.
This is particularly so for Dutton after Trump’s call for Canada to become the 51st US state finished off Justin Trudeau’s leadership and paradoxically installed his replacement, Mark Carney, as favourite to win the April 28 election after the Conservatives’ support crashed. After his first conversation with Carney, Trump even appeared to endorse his leadership, saying he would speak to him straight after the election.
Albanese started the formal campaign according to Labor’s plan of hammering health and personally demonising the Opposition Leader at every opportunity, reaping the polling benefits of a closer contest and a fall in Dutton’s standing.
For Dutton, there are real dangers here, with some Coalition MPs calling on him to “do more” as they feel real heat of a campaign after 18 months of having set the agenda and having the Prime Minister on the back foot.
But time is running out for Dutton as Labor’s team frames him more negatively every day – Trumpian, hubristic and arrogant – and promotes Labor’s “tax cuts for everyone” to offset the Coalition’s promise to halve petrol excise.
Trump’s tariffs may help to underline Labor’s failures on cost-of-living pressure and play to the Coalition’s traditional strengths on economic management, but they move the focus from the campaign. Dutton needs to start to unveil some meat for his supporters and colleagues to ensure the loss of momentum doesn’t get worse and Labor can’t use the Easter and Anzac Day breaks to kill the campaign and deprive him of oxygen.
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