One of the benefits of working for the Trump White House was that the president’s chief of staff Mick Mulvaney could play golf at Trump National in Potomac Falls, Virginia – or indeed at any Trump golf course. I was playing a fair bit of golf by this time, even if my game was … let’s say “inconsistent”. Others might go so far as to call it “erratic”. Despite my less than stellar golf skills, Mick rang me one week in early April 2018 and invited me to join him that Sunday for a round of golf. “I’ll ask Bret Baier from Fox News, and we’ll play at Trump,” he said. Bret was also a good mate, and I readily accepted. I suspected something interesting was happening, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. To this day, Mick says it was just a coincidence, but I had a feeling we would have a special guest as our fourth. I texted Malcolm Turnbull: “I think I might be playing golf with Donald Trump on Sunday.” “Do you think that’s a good idea?” he wrote back. “Well, I am,” I texted, and left it at that. Mick picked me up in his bulletproof Secret Service black SUV (they are actually very uncomfortable). On our way there, the phone rang. It was the president. He was apparently just calling around looking for a game. “Mick, I’m playing with you – see you up there,” President Trump told Mulvaney. “Okay, see you then, Mr President.”
The prospect of playing with President Trump at Trump National was more than enough to make me the most nervous I’d been on a golf course for a while. “Mick, you know I play off twenty-four, don’t you?” I said, mindful that, in golf, the higher your handicap, the more forgiving the other players might be. “I know, you’re a hopeless golfer, Joe,” replied Mick. “Don’t tell the president, and let’s get to the practice range as soon as we can.” Not long after we started warming up, Trump arrived, accompanied by 40 or 50 security staff in golf carts. I was told there were even snipers stationed around the course. This remarkable display of force did nothing to soothe my nerves. We arrived at the first tee, and there was the president. “So, Joe, what do you play off?” President Trump asked me. “These days twenty-eight, Mr President,” I said, exaggerating my handicap now, in the hope I wouldn’t be viewed as too hopeless. “Well, I’m only giving you eighteen,” Trump snapped. “It’s not a negotiation, Mr President, I really do play off twenty eight,” I said. I was trying my best to not get pushed around early, to avoid making a complete fool of myself. “It’s my course, and I’m giving you a handicap of eighteen,” he replied sternly. “Oh, and you team up with Mick. I will team up with Bret.” Negotiation over.
Trump National sits on the banks of the famous Potomac River. It’s what is known as a links course: it has no trees and lots of bunkers, and on a very cold, windy, wet Sunday in April it was as intimidating as hell. As has been well chronicled, Trump is both an enthusiastic and genuinely good golfer, with a handicap of 12 or 13. I’ve golfed with him a few times and he always played in the spirit of the game, albeit fiercely competitively. It’s very stressful playing golf with the president of the United States. When he got going, Trump really flew along the course, and of course all the other carts with the Secret Service members would flock after him. That doesn’t give you a lot of fairway to play with. At one point I was playing my second shot, hitting to the green, but I looked up to see Trump had already parked his cart on the putting green – unusual behaviour – and was lining up his ball to putt. “Oi! You know I have to hit my ball?” I yelled to the president at the top of my voice. “Hit it here. C’mon, Joe, hit it here!” Trump yelled back, waving me on from the green. I stood there and pondered my situation. Could I really hit my ball right at the president of the United States? I wasn’t sure if he was serious. How many people in the world would want to be in my position right now, I wondered. “Hit it, Joe, hit it!” he continued, gesticulating on the green. So I pulled out my eight iron to play the shot, which I judged was around 150 metres. All of a sudden, my thoughts were interrupted by a deep voice behind me: “Do not hit the president of the United States, sir.” I looked around to see a Secret Service agent in a suit and sunglasses standing behind me with a club in his hand. “But he’s on the green – he’s waving me on,” I said. Meanwhile, Trump was still yelling in the background. “You can hit it to the right, you can hit to the left, you can hit it over his head. But you’re not hitting it at the president of the United States.” The agent handed me a five iron, and I hit the ball way over Trump’s head. The president watched the ball flying over the green, then waved his hand dismissively and moved on.
When he wasn’t charging ahead, Trump asked me a lot of questions. Indeed, throughout my dealings with him as ambassador, Trump was constantly asking questions. He displayed a lot of genuine curiosity about people and events, and in pretty much everything going on around him. And one of his first questions was: “What do you think of Malcolm Turnbull?” Now, Malcolm was not only my boss, he was Australia’s prime minister. The last thing I wanted to do was kick off another feud between the pair following the disastrous first leaked phone call by saying the wrong thing. Much to my relief, before I could say anything Trump answered his own question. “I like him now,” he said. Apparently, their meeting on USS Intrepid for the Battle of the Coral Sea commemoration had had the intended effect. Trump knew Kerry Packer from the 1980s and 90s. Referring to Malcolm being Packer’s one-time barrister, “He (Malcolm) must be pretty smart because he kept Kerry Packer out of jail,” Trump said nonchalantly. I wanted to explain that Kerry was not guilty of anything and wasn’t even charged in that case, and that he was one of Australia’s most revered businessmen. Before I could, Trump started going through his cabinet, asking my opinion of his people. He’d obviously done his homework, because he knew I’d met General Mattis. (“They call him Mad Dog, you know?”) I was highly complimentary of Mattis, and especially of his attitude towards the Indo-Pacific and the US-Australian relationship. But the person he really wanted to ask me about – indeed, I suspect this was the reason he came along to play golf with us that day – was Alexander Downer (or “Downing”, as he always referred to him). In May 2016, Australia’s former foreign minister was our High Commissioner in London, where one day he met with George Papadopoulos, a Trump campaign adviser. It was Downer’s report about this meeting that led the FBI to open a counterintelligence investigation into the efforts of the Russian government to disrupt the 2016 US presidential election. Trump thus consistently blamed Downer for sparking the investigation led by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, which caused him so much grief between 2017 and 2019.
We decided to head back to the clubhouse after just 13 holes because the weather was awful. It was a windy, rainy and very cold afternoon. Mick and I were playing as partners against Bret and President Trump. According to the scorecard at the end of the 12th hole, each team had won six holes. It was all square. I had to sink a 12-metre putt on the last green to win. It was a horrendously difficult putt – the ball basically had to do a cartwheel to get into the hole. As I lined it up, my heart was racing. I was thinking about the implications of missing – and the implications of landing it. Would the president of the United States take offence if I beat him? Would a victory place a new strain on US–Australian relations? Regardless, I was going for the win. I hit my putt, and the eyes of the president, Mulvaney, Baier, the caddie and about 40 support staff and Secret Service agents followed the little white ball along the green. To the amazement of us all, it went into the hole. Fortunately, there was a photographer there who took a great photo: Baier and Mulvaney are jumping up in triumph, and the president is standing there with a grin on his face. In golf, you only need one good shot to bring you back. I’d just beaten the president of the United States on the golf course!
After the game, we headed back to the clubhouse for lunch. “That was amazing, Hockey,” Mick said to me as we walked. “Where did you pull that from?” Before I could respond, he continued: “He’ll respect you more for doing that. The last thing the president wants is for someone to throw the game.” Oh yeah, as if, I thought. I could sink those all day! The clubhouse at Trump National reflects its proprietor’s oversized personality. It has high ceilings and breathtaking views of the fairways. In the dining room, all the TVs were set to Fox News. As we ordered lunch, Trump insisted that we all try the clam chowder, saying it was fantastic. I’d already ordered the tomato soup, while Baier and Mulvaney had ordered other soups. We all started on our soups, but the president kept saying how good the clam chowder was. He was in sales mode. I was on my fourth spoonful of tomato soup when three staff appeared and took away our bowls. They were promptly replaced with clam chowder. “Don’t worry, Joe,” he added, “you’re not fat. Have the clam chowder.” That was the second presidential order I followed in the service of my country. And it was great clam chowder.
This is an edited extract from Diplomatic: A Washington Memoir by Joe Hockey with Leo Shanahan, published by HarperCollins. Out Wednesday.
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