Kevin Rudd hugs Donald Trump’s nemesis Gavin Newsom, as Anthony Albanese locks in White House date
Anthony Albanese has locked in his first Oval Office meeting with Donald Trump, as Kevin Rudd and Chris Bowen embrace and hold talks with the US President's political nemesis Gavin Newsom.
Anthony Albanese and Donald Trump have locked in a long-awaited Oval Office meeting and shaken hands for the first time, as US ambassador Kevin Rudd embraced and held talks with the President’s political arch rival Gavin Newsom.
The Prime Minister’s bilateral meeting at the White House on October 20 was revealed before Mr Albanese took a beaming selfie with the US President.
After taking the selfie, Mr Albanese on Thursday (AEST) was tight-lipped about his brief encounter with Mr Trump.
“We had a very warm and engaging chat. I tend not to broadcast private discussions but it was very warm. And we look forward to a further discussion in a few weeks’ time,” Mr Albanese said.
The face-to-face encounter between Mr Albanese and Mr Trump came hours after the President gave a scorching address to the UN labelling “falsely-named” renewables a “joke”, and warning “all green is bankrupt”.
Earlier in the day, Mr Newsom – the powerful California governor and a 2028 presidential frontrunner for the Democrats – sat down with Dr Rudd and Energy Minister Chris Bowen to discuss green energy rollouts in Australia and California.
Social media photos and a video posted by Mr Newsom, who will end his tenure as California Governor before next year’s US midterm elections due to term limits, show the prominent climate change supporter hugging Dr Rudd and interacting warmly with Mr Bowen.
Mr Newsom has replaced Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton as the Democrat who Mr Trump devotes most of his time to attacking. The California governor is just ahead of the President’s vanquished 2024 opponent, Kamala Harris, in the aggregate of polls for the 2028 Democratic presidential nomination.
The engagement with Mr Newsom emerged on the same day that Mr Albanese briefly met Mr Trump for the first time at a UN General Assembly welcome reception in New York, hosted by the US President and First Lady Melania Trump.
Asked if he would meet with Mr Newsom, who is speaking at the same New York Times climate change conference as the Prime Minister, Mr Albanese said he wouldn’t be because he had “a pretty full card” and stated that he previously met the California Governor in San Francisco.
On whether Australia would join France and be involved in a stabilisation peacekeeping force in Gaza following a ceasefire, Mr Albanese said his government would “give consideration to that at an appropriate time”.
In addition to a ceasefire, the release of all hostages and providing access for aid, Mr Albanese – who announced this week that Australia supports Palestinian recognition - said “we want to deal with the long-term solution that is required”.
Pressed on whether he would lift defence spending given Mr Trump’s administration is demanding Australia lift its commitment to 3.5 per cent of GDP, Mr Albanese said “we’ll continue to monitor and examine what capability Australia needs”.
“We have increased our spending now by around about $70bn compared with what we inherited.”
Mr Albanese earlier sat in the UN General Assembly hall as Mr Trump used a 57-minute address to criticise the UN for being weak and warn that a “double-tailed monster” of immigration and green energy was destroying the free world.
Mr Albanese’s week in New York for his first UNGA as Prime Minister has focused heavily on Palestinian recognition, climate change and clean energy – issues attacked by Mr Trump in his first UN speech since 2020.
After Australia and the US went more than 10 months without a leader-to-leader meeting since Mr Trump’s election victory, Dr Rudd on Wednesday revealed the Labor leader would travel to the US for a third time since June for a White House appointment.
“We were delighted to have the White House confirm … that the PM will be back in the United States on the 20th of October to meet with the President of the United States in Washington DC. This relationship will go from strength to strength,” Dr Rudd said at an event for US bankers and investors held at the Macquarie Group’s New York headquarters.
Around the same time as Dr Rudd’s announcement, Mr Newsom published posts on social media, including a photo of the former prime minister hugging him.
“Grateful to (Kevin Rudd) and Climate & Energy Minister Chris Bowen for strengthening our clean energy partnership and advancing a sustainable future for California and Australia,” Mr Newsom posted on his official Californian Governor X account.
Mr Newsom – who will appear at the same The New York Times Climate Forward conference at which Mr Albanese is speaking on Thursday (AEST) – has been in New York holding high-level meetings as part of UN Climate Week engagements.
The California Governor also met UK Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Miliband, European Union Commission climate, net zero and clean growth commissioner Wopke Hoekstra and Brazilian Environment Minister Marina Silva.
California, a global leader in climate technology, signed an MOU with the Labor government in 2023 to work together on their respective green energy rollouts.
Government sources saw the meeting with Mr Newsom – the leader of a clean power giant – as part of the push by Mr Albanese and Mr Bowen in New York to entice investors to get involved in Australia’s renewables revolution, amid a fierce contest with the European Union for green capital looking beyond America as Mr Trump abandons Mr Biden’s climate agenda.
Mr Newsom also reported a video clip of Mr Trump’s UNGA speech shared by his press office, which hit back at the US President’s declaration that “climate change is the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world”.
“Meanwhile, back in reality, California – the 4th largest economy in the world – is running on 2/3rds clean energy with 25 per cent of all new car sales being ZEVs (zero emissions vehicles). Not to mention, billions going back into the pockets of millions of Californians,” Mr Newsom’s post said.
With Democratic congressional leaders in Washington sidelined because of their dwindled numbers and the stinging defeat in the presidential election last November, Mr Newsom has used his power as the head of the most populous US state to fight Mr Trump at every turn.
Mr Newsom has worked to hamper Mr Trump’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents efforts to deport illegal immigrants, tried to redraw California’s electoral maps to massively boost the number of Democrat congressmen in next year’s midterm elections, and accused Mr Trump of having dementia.
The California Governor has also set up a huge social media operation devoted to attacking and provoking Mr Trump and his White House administration, ahead of a potential presidential run.
Before the first bilateral meeting between Mr Albanese and Mr Trump, the Labor government is highly sensitive about not upsetting the unpredictable Republican billionaire.
Dr Rudd’s embrace with Mr Newsom came after the former ALP prime minister had finally had put an end to months-long questions about his ability to organise a meeting between Mr Albanese and Mr Trump.
The US ambassador has struggled to gain access and influence with the Trump administration, following statements he has made attacking the President over many years.
Climate change, renewables, carbon footprints and migration dominated the thrust of Mr Trump’s speech, alongside rebukes of western nations for recognising Palestine and critiques about the UN’s failure to live up to its purpose and overblowing the “global climate catastrophe”.
Asked about Mr Trump’s attack on renewables and climate change, Mr Albanese said: “My job is to be the Australian Prime Minister and to seize the opportunities that are there for Australia.
“And Australia has a challenge of climate change, but we also have an opportunity to benefit our economy, to grow jobs. We certainly are embarking on that, and we have a positive, constructive agenda.”
Mr Albanese’s oval office meeting with Mr Trump is expected to end speculation over the future of the $368bn AUKUS nuclear submarines deal, clarify whether Australia can win greater tariffs exemptions and determine if the government will significantly ramp up defence spending.
The Prime Minister said he would not “broadcast everything” about his discussions with Mr Trump, which he described as “diplomatic”. Mr Albanese and Mr Trump have spoken four times on the phone since the Republican won the election last November.
Mr Albanese will on Thursday (AEST) deliver his first national statement to the UN General Assembly, which he flagged would talk up Australia as a “country that punches above our weight”.
“We’re a middle power. We are players in the world. We have an international outlook, and we’re a country that engages respectfully with our partners as well,” he will say.
“And I think the way that we deal in our region as well, we are a middle power globally, but in our region, in the Pacific and in ASEAN, we’re significant, and we engage, and my government is forward leaning in engaging with our neighbours.”
His comments come after Australia this month failed to secure a defence treaty with Papua New Guinea and a security agreement with Vanuatu, both aimed at countering the growing influence of China in the South Pacific.
Mr Albanese is facing a congested travel schedule over the next two months, with the ASEAN and East Asia summits in Malaysia scheduled around October 27-28 and the APEC Economic Leaders’s meeting slated for October 31 and November 1. The Australian understands Mr Albanese is likely to travel to Japan in between the ASEAN and APEC summits.
The Labor leader is also expected to fly to South Africa for the G20 in November and potentially attend the COP30 climate change conference in Brazil later that month, depending on whether Australia can force Turkey to drop its rival bid to host next year’s COP31 summit.
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