PETER VAN ONSELEN: The volatile election X factor that has both Albo and Peter Dutton worried
Six days before Australia Day next year Donald Trump will take over as US President for the second time.
Six days before Australia Day next year Donald Trump will take over as US President for the second time. It shouldn’t take long for Trump 2.0 to begin changing the global political environment, both courtesy of his domestic policy settings and the approach he takes to the international stage.
Whether the next Australian federal election comes early (in February or March) or Anthony Albanese sticks to his promise to serve a full term and hold it in May, the campaign will play out in the midst of totemic political change abroad.
Trump will attempt mass deportations from the United States. To honour this election pledge he may even use the US military to achieve his desired outcome. The environment will be tense and contested.
How will Australias political class react? It will put Labor and the Greens in a more difficult position than the Coalition. The Greens will certainly mouth off about it, what will Albo do?
Trump will certainly withdraw the US from the Paris Agreement, just like he did in 2016. Such a move has the potential to change the nature of the climate change debate in Australia.
Labor has gone all in defending its emissions targets and condemning Peter Dutton’s nuclear ambitions. Trump isn’t the sort of foreign leader who will diplomatically stay out of Australia’s business as the election looms large.
Will rhetorical interventions by Trump - sure to favour Dutton over Albo - help the opposition leader or sound warning bells for Australian voters who regard Trump as too extreme?
While Trump tapped into the mainstream America mood, the US electoral system doesn’t include compulsory voting or preference flows. Such differences, combined with cultural variations between our nations, mean that his appeal in the US might not be matched here.
Albo risks becoming the proverbial ham in the sandwich as two great powers go to war, metaphorically speaking
Can Dutton draw on Trump’s pro-drilling sentiments to isolate Labor and the Greens as threats to mining led prosperity?
Dutton needs to be careful not to seek to emulate Trump in a mistaken belief that doing so will help him match Trumps political success.
That said, the incoming US Presidents ‘drill baby, drill’ ethos might appeal where it most matters in Australia. Mining is essential to our export economy, so supporting the sector should matter to all Australians, but it is especially important to West Australians.
Currently internal party polls suggest Labor is performing better than expected in the west, with Liberals under-confident about picking up more than one, possibly two seats. The Morrison government lost six of the 11 seats it held before the 2022 election, the federal Liberal Partys worst performance in WA in 35 years.
Can Dutton draw on Trump’s pro-drilling sentiments to isolate Labor and the Greens as threats to mining led prosperity? Helping win back more seats in the west to help dislodge Albo’s parliamentary majority?
Trump’s protectionist agenda is its own threat to Australian exports of all kinds, but it is the impact Trump’s tariffs might have on China that looms largest.
China will need to respond: will a domestic stimulus package in China targeting infrastructure create even more demand for Aussie iron ore? Or will China retaliate against US allies, which would include Australia, because of Trumps tariff moves?
Either scenario will put our PM in an awkward position leading up to a tight election. Albo risks becoming the proverbial ham in the sandwich as two great powers go to war, metaphorically speaking.
Billionaire Elon Musk has already called out Albo and his government for its social media policies affecting his business interests. Musk will soon have a formal role within the Trump administration, as he celebrates free speech on technology platforms around the world, while slashing government departments at home.
There is every chance Musk seeks to do within Australia what he didn’t ahead of the US election: backing a political horse of his choosing. That horse certainly won’t be Albo.
Our pre-election period will take place amidst all of the above, and that’s before you even consider what might happen in Ukraine, the Middle East and even in Taiwan and the South China Sea. Although these heady issues are more likely to matter in the years rather than months to come, beyond just the first half of 2025.
Challenges for whoever wins the Australian election, to be sure.
The word that best describes what impact Trump’s victory will have on the next federal election campaign is volatility.
Without overstating the impact who becomes US President can have on our domestic polity, Trump is larger than life and can’t be ignored as a volatile factor both major party leaders and their strategists need to be mindful of.
That mindfulness could even be a factor as Albo contemplates when to call the next election.
