Trump criticizes former Australian PM for stating that CCP leader is more ‘respectful’

March 10, 2025 TruthUSA

Former PM Malcolm Turnbull has been vocal on his views regarding the Trump administration and his former colleagues.

U.S. President Donald Trump has launched a stinging rebuke of former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull after comments on Bloomberg saying the CCP leadership was more “respectful” than Trump.

In a post to Truth Social, Trump accused Turnbull of failing to grasp China and lacking the ability to lead, saying that the average Australian shared his view.

“Malcolm Turnbull, the former Prime Minister of Australia who was always leading that wonderful country from ‘behind,’ never understood what was going on in China, nor did he have the capacity to do so,” Trump said on Truth Social.

“I always thought he was a weak and ineffective leader and, obviously, Australian’s agreed with me,” he said, hinting at the fact Turnbull is no longer in power.

Turnbull, who served as Prime Minister of Australia from September 2015 until he was ousted as leader in August 2018, took to X to share a link to a Bloomberg TV interview where he said, “Trump’s chaos is a gift to [CCP leader] Xi Jinping.”

Turnbull claimed the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader Xi Jinping would aim to be the “exact opposite of Trump.”

“Where Trump is chaotic, he will be consistent. Where Trump is rude and abusive, he’ll be respectful,” Turnbull claimed.

This is despite Xi’s authoritarian rule over China that has suppressed dissent, limited freedoms, and quashed opposition. The CCP has been more expansionist under his reign, including building security alliances around the world.

U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump welcome former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and his wife Lucy Turnbull to the White House, Feb. 23, 2018. (Alex Wong/Getty Images) — U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump welcome former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and his wife Lucy Turnbull to the White House, Feb. 23, 2018. Alex Wong/Getty Images

During the interview with Bloomberg, Turnbull said “who knows” if Trump’s second term would be less chaotic than his first.

“I mean you’ve had tariffs going on, going off, going back on again. And you know this uncertainty … it’s hitting the markets too, I mean it’s bad for business,” Turnbull said.

“I would say this time he is more determined, he has got a team that is totally on board with him, you know he’s surrounded by ‘yes’ men, supporters, and [during] the first Trump administration he didn’t really expect to win, he wasn’t really prepared, he hired a lot of people who were not from his camp or his MAGA movement …”

Turnbull agreed Trump had a mandate, but said he did not think Americans would be happy if inflation starts to go up or if they go into recession.

“You know people are very pessimistic about the consequence of his policies, I mean if this triggers a global wave of protectionism around the world and that’s clearly going to be bad for business everywhere,” Turnbull said.

“You know Trump seems to have a view that America can prosper at the expense of everybody else but that’s not going to work.

Turnbull has run-ins with Trump, which improved over time during the U.S. president’s first term.

In once tense phone call in January 2017, shortly after Trump took office, the U.S. president tried to end an ongoing deal for the United States to accept 1,250 refugees from Australian offshore detention centres, and called a phone call with Turnbull “the worst call by far.”

The former prime minister has been a vocal critic of the activities of Trump, as well as his former centre-right Liberal Party colleagues.

During the Jan. 6 riots, Turnbull said the “mob violence“ at the Capitol was the ”culmination of Trump’s sustained assault on American democracy.”

Lately, Turnbull has been critical of current Liberal leader Peter Dutton’s policy for Australia to adopt nuclear power.

“I would add the nuclear policy abandons rational market economics. Liberals who support this could only do so for tribal reasons,” he wrote on X.

Australian Leaders Optimistic About Trump Administration

The episode comes as current Australian leaders maintain public support for the U.S.-Australian relationship amid ongoing media scrutiny.

Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Richard Marles said the relationship with the Trump administration was “going well“ during a recent interview.

Marles noted he had recently met with U.S. Secretary of Defense Peter Hegseth and said Trump Republicans had been supportive of the AUKUS defence pact.

“If you look at the speed with which I’ve been able to meet my counterpart in Washington, I was the first of his international counterparts that he met at anyone around the world,” Marles said.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong also attended the Trump inauguration and was one of the first foreign leaders (along with the Quad) to meet with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Washington.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has described the United States as an important ally and is confident he can work well with the new administration.

“Well, I’ve worked very closely with the Obama Administration, with the Trump Administration, with the Biden Administration, and we have good relationships with a number of people in the 47th presidency in the West Wing, and we can work very closely and effectively with them,” Dutton said.

Australians also view bilateral ties as important, with 69 percent of Australians expressing the need for both major leaders to work with Donald Trump.

Only 29 percent of Australians want a distant relationship with the United States, the RedBridge Accent Research poll revealed.

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