Trump Was Happy He Didn’t Have to Get to Know Another Australian PM, Sources Claim

On Sunday morning, in the wake of Scott Morrison’s surprise victory in the 2019 Australian federal election, President Donald Trump took to Twitter to congratulate the incumbent prime minister. “Congratulations to Scott on a GREAT WIN!” he wrote, obviously pleased that Morrison had managed, against seemingly insurmountable odds, to retain the leadership mantle. Now, sources close to Trump have indicated that the president was simply relieved he didn’t have to build a relationship with yet another Australian prime minister, Fairfax reports.

It’s been a turbulent year for Australia as far as the nation’s leadership goes. Malcolm Turbull was usurped by Morrison just eight months ago, and in the period leading up to Saturday night’s election it was looking all but certain that the title was going to be passed over once again to opposition leader Bill Shorten. Had Shorten won the leadership bid, Australia would have had three prime ministers within a 12 month period. And Washington sources told The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald that President Trump, for one, found that prospect bizarre.

No one likes having to build new working relationships from the ground up—trudging through the formalities and small talk, trying to work out the chemistry—and another reason for Trump’s relief could be the possibility of clashing with the next prospective leader. The president infamously locked horns with former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull in 2017, during a heated phone call in which they discussed a refugee swap deal—negotiated by the Obama administration—that would have seen the United States potentially accepting asylum seekers that had been stopped on their way to Australia.

“As far as I am concerned that is enough Malcolm,” Trump declared towards the end of that correspondence. “I have had it. I have been making these calls all day and this is the most unpleasant call all day. Putin was a pleasant call. This is ridiculous.”

Morrison, Turnbull’s successor, first met Trump at December's G20 Summit in Buenos Aires last year. Earlier this week the ABC revealed that when he spoke to Morrison on Sunday morning, Trump compared the prime minister’s election victory to his own presidential win in 2016, as well as the United Kingdom’s Brexit vote that same year. In particular, Trump reportedly observed the way in which people "seem surprised" by the result.

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