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The date has been set.

That's right, the Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the US President Donald Trump will meet in the flesh on the sidelines of the G7 in Canada.

Now, the Prime Minister says he'll pitch the benefits of that very expensive, that very contentious AUKUS subs deal and press Australia's position on tariffs when he meets with the US President.

It comes as he touches down in Canada for the G7 summit, where he's already rubbed shoulders with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney.

But with the Iran-Israel conflict threatening to overshadow, well, everything,

Anthony Albanese is joining other leaders to urge de-escalation.

Welcome to Politics Now.

Hi, I'm Patricia Carvellis.

And I'm Jacob Grieber.

And Jacob, before we even get into that, congratulations on your 7.30 gig.

I'm very excited to watch you on 7.30, but also for this amazing union between us to be even stronger, my friend, as

you use politics now for your prep time before you go and look down the barrel to the nation.

You can't leave politics now.

That was what I said to them.

Look, this great offer came up.

I couldn't say no.

7.30 report or the 7.30 job, please edit that out.

I'll get fired before I even start.

That's a bit of old history there.

And in fact, I have been watching that show since Kerry O'Brien was a teenager, probably.

So

I'm just in awe of having a go,

being given that awesome responsibility to have a crack.

So yeah, thanks very much, PK.

But I did say to them, I did want to keep doing this podcast with you on Monday, if that could work.

And it sounds like it can work.

I think it can.

So we will stay together and you never know, even expand our union, my friend.

Hint, hint, nudge, nudge.

But we will keep talking together because that's what we like to do.

So let's start talking together on what is, I think, a really significant...

development and that is this meeting that's been secured.

Now, the reason it's significant is, well, last time you and I met, Jacob, we thought it might happen.

It hadn't yet happened.

They often happen at the last minute.

So yes, now it's been secured, this meeting between Trump and our Prime Minister.

We'll get into how important that meeting is in a moment.

But in the meantime, our Prime Minister, of course, has landed in Canada.

We're not in the G7, but we've been invited, which often does happen.

Extra countries that have significance.

We're a middle power.

We are not insignificant on the world stage.

So we get invited, Mark Carney invited us, and now the diplomatic speed dating is already underway.

What's What's been happening in that space?

Because this is a great opportunity for Australia, of course, to meet with lots of nations, all in the one place.

It's a really big stage for the PM to be on.

Mark Carney is obviously inviting countries like Australia, and there's not that many others really going beyond the G7, as a way to sort of signal who he regards as the most important players in this.

And Australia is a classic middle power, economically strong, but it doesn't have the population of a Germany or a Russia or an Indonesia.

So it sort of plays a unique role.

Obviously Canada and Australia have a very close relationship and I think the new Prime Minister in Canada is really trying to sort of build a bulwark, if you like, of like-minded democratic countries who can stand together.

in what are incredibly uncertain times and that's really what you're seeing on display here with this g7 and of course the prime minister knows he has a big challenge coming up in the next 48 hours we'll talk about that in a second and that's that's really sitting over the top of all of this but i think the that all the other countries that are getting together here in this very fancy looking uh mountain resort in alberta i'd love to go there that's really about sending a message that countries will continue to work together, that this idea of America first turning into America only doesn't play, that other leaders don't accept a world where mighty is right, which is the Donald Trump view of the world, that that can't stand, that there has to be cooperation on a lot of these really tricky issues, including things that are unfolding as we speak in Iran and

Israel.

We'll talk about that too, I presume.

Now, I don't know what you think, PK, but what does a good summit look like for the PM?

Well, this is the thing.

So there are two angles angles here.

So the G7

will now almost certainly be dominated by what is a war in the Middle East.

Let's not just call it sort of tit for tat.

We are in a war now and a war, I think, of historic proportions with incredible ramifications for that region but the world.

It has escalated quite significantly, even as we record in the last few moments.

So we can talk about that.

I think it's important we talk about that.

So one part of a successful meeting is some sort of unity around a message of de-escalation and coming to a deal with Iran, between Israel and Iran, rather than a war that's never-ending.

That is worst case scenario, but we did, what, there was an eight-year war, wasn't there, between Iraq, Iran.

Like there is precedent for wars to become never-ending wars.

So the biggest, I think, objective for the G7 will now be this.

But originally, I think it was quite clear that the G7 was going to be very focused on issues around trade, and that was going to be a prickly issue

because of the Trump America first position.

So a successful meeting for Australia is different, I suppose, for the world.

I've noticed when the Prime Minister spoke, so we're recording this Monday, he gave a little press conference.

Interestingly, there was also, which I just have to say because it's so full of colour, there was a moment between him and Mark Carney.

Now, lots of leaders have to do this thing that I suspect they both, hate, but they have to do.

It's a dance, where they have to create pictures, right?

And it's for news coverage and a little bit of propaganda, really, for them too.

Where they stand around and they do a bit of small talk and they've got the cameras over them.

It's not the official meeting, but it sort of demonstrates the sorts of themes.

And in the small talk, our Prime Minister made a little mistake where he said to Mark Carney, we share a continent.

We clearly don't.

And Mark Carney comes back right in, like, doesn't miss a beat, and says in a really funny way, actually, you've got your own.

And then our PM says, oh, I mean, we share a large land mass.

Now, that is accurate, Prime Minister.

We do both have a large land mass.

Canadian land mass is a bit bigger than ours, as I've learned in the past, which I was in denial about, but it is.

We're big countries.

We're important countries.

We have very similar colonial histories, First Nations stories, like we actually share quite a lot, common values.

So that's all there.

I think the relationship between Mark Carney and the Prime Minister is an important one because they do stand, I think, very firmly together against that sort of Trump nationalism, that America First nationalism.

And also in the geopolitical space, I think de-escalation is on the agenda for both of them.

Interestingly, though, back, and I want to hear your views very much, Jacob, when the Prime Minister was asked what he was going to try and achieve in this meeting with Trump, which is pretty important,

he suggests AUKUS and trade are his priorities.

Now, it seems to me that the Prime Minister, and I've used this term for him before, very much staying in his lane when it comes to Israel and Iran.

Sure, they will absolutely join other like-minded countries, New Zealand, UK, you know, and say de-escalation, back to the negotiating table, get a deal with Iran.

That is our preference clearly as a nation.

But is he going to go into the meeting with Trump and really

press the point about Israel and Iran?

Absolutely not.

It seems to me he wants to walk out with at least a commitment, some language from Trump that he does want to commit to AUKUS, Jacob.

That's really important, especially now that there's this review into AUKUS.

So

that point you made about the land mass, I think is actually quite interesting as well for another reason.

If you think it through,

we've had this argument now between the Trump administration and the Albanese government about defense spending.

The Americans want us to really ramp it up above 3% of GDP.

We're at 2%.

Big, big push from the Americans to get all their allies to spend more.

Now, one of the interesting arguments that sits underneath all of this is a view in America that we don't actually contribute enough in defense because we have a social welfare system.

We spend a lot of money on other things that people like and need and want.

And Americans will love those.

Education.

All those things.

So there's this sort of American argument that's, well, we'd like all that stuff too, but we don't because we've got to spend all this money on defense.

I was talking to

Professor Curran,

who's at Sydney University.

I think I've got that right.

James Curran, he's a historian.

And he says, look,

there's this misconception in America.

They actually don't understand this in America, that we are a very sparsely populated continent.

And that means it is actually quite expensive and difficult for us to manage some of these security issues.

And that's really similar to Canada, I think.

So

it's quite interesting that the two of them had that little exchange.

It's a direct signal, I suspect, to Donald Trump and the Americans who are arguing that, you know,

you guys need to up your spending on this.

It's a really interesting debate.

That will not go away, but it sits underneath what you're right.

You're so right.

This is the full test for this meeting for both leaders, quite frankly.

We've not heard a full-throated support of AUKUS from Donald Trump since he's become president for the second time.

I don't know what the acronym was.

Let's not forget that moment.

And so this is where the big, deep anxiety is coming from on the Australian side.

We've signed up to this thing.

We're sending them checks of money to help build their shipbuilding factories to get their apprentices

trained up to do this work

with no cast iron guarantee that we get a boat at the end of all of this or any boats, the American President has to be convinced that America's security is safe before they give us one of these boats that we pay for.

So it's a really, really challenging position for us to be in as a country.

There is no Plan B, the defence experts tell us.

And so the Prime Minister needs a really, really strong signal from Donald Trump that everything is in order, that the Americans are are still supportive, that the review that was announced last week is just about calibrating, making sure the details are right, that it's not more fundamental than that.

If it's anything else than that, then I think that's a real big problem for the Prime Minister when he gets back on that jet back home.

There'll be huge questions about that if he doesn't get that kind of an assurance.

On the trade fund, I don't know, PK, I think it's a little more tricky, yeah.

Because

Donald Trump's trying to punish everyone at the same time, so who knows?

Yeah, trade, I think, if we can start there, and then I'll sort of segue back to the original point around AUKUS.

But on trade, I've noticed something really interesting post-election, which is that the pressure to get a deal on trade, an exemption on trade, appears to me

to actually be declining.

A sort of, I don't know, what will I call it?

A radical realism about

a radical acceptance of what America is and how unlikely it is to be able to get a deal or even more so, to get a deal that's worth it.

That's the key bit.

So yeah, okay, let's presume we could get some sort of deal by selling the house, so to speak.

No one really supports that.

And there's no political pressure to really achieve that.

And if you hear key figures who have, you know, a lot of history here and very strong views, like people like Malcolm Turnbull, who basically said to me last week, you know, it's not worth getting any deal.

Like, it's better to walk out without a deal than to give away much.

So, yes, critical minerals back on the table.

We will give you sort of first-class access to our critical minerals

when, of course, China is such a dominant player here.

And, of course, the competition between America and China is at the heart of all of these struggles.

That will be something that the Prime Minister no doubt raises.

But whether he walks out with a signed deal on this, I think that's personally, from what I'm hearing, quite unlikely.

Back to your AUKUS point, the Prime Minister, I don't think, will go in assuming he will get a sort of signed deal saying, AUKUS, not going to be touched, it's perfect.

But some sort of engagement in terms of language from the President, that he sees that this is a deal that benefits both nations, is the sort of lowest requirement that Australia will want.

The problem, though, for Australia, and it neatly takes me to something I really want to talk about, which is Iran and Israel, is that you cannot underestimate what a big story this is and how absolutely all-consuming it is for the president and should be, by the way, should be, as an incredible player here, as the US has enormous influence over Israel, if used, can have enormous influence here.

The problem for Albanese is a little bit timing.

The president will certainly has taken the meeting, but I don't know what the kind of level of effort in the meeting will be rather than a meet and greet.

We've seen each other in person, build a rapport.

Rapports are important.

But, Jacob, in terms of a really detailed meeting with the kind of exhaustive work that has to go in to walk out with something tangible, I'm not seeing it because I think the world just got uglier.

Look, he's got a lot on his plate, the president, no question about it.

Well, he's had these conflict, this conflict in California where he's like almost literally at war with a state.

Not literally, almost literally, for sending in

National Guard and Marines.

And so he's got that bubbling away.

He's got, he had a trade deal last week, a very preliminary one with the Chinese, which, by the way, might actually weaken Australia's hand because that deal, if you believe the Trump version of it, will secure a lot of these critical minerals from China.

And then does that mean that the Americans are not so fussed now about Australia's supply?

That'll be something the Prime Minister will be no doubt hashing out with him.

And then

this huge escalation now

between Israel and Iran, that is very much with America in play.

We've heard reports this morning.

I don't think they are necessarily confirmed that Netanyahu wanted to take out the Ayatollah, that the Israelis were in a position to do that.

And Donald Trump essentially stopped that from happening.

So that's the American version of that story.

The Israelis have not, as we record, denied that.

So that's a really interesting play by the president.

And I think the fear there would have been that would have taken it to such another level, taking out a sort of political, religious leader of that sort of

stature.

Really,

we're in a new world once you start doing that.

Well, the ramifications in terms of disruption, protest,

insurgency, terror.

Add more words in the Middle East.

Obviously,

the Israelis want to, they want regime change in Iran.

Well, they've made it clear, right, now?

But

what is the regime change?

What are they looking for?

You and I have both been around covering these things, looking at these things.

I'm thinking here about

the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The issue of, yeah, you go in, you break it, but then you own it, to use Colin Powell's language, the former Defence Secretary to George W.

Bush, you own the problem.

What is the plan?

What is the regime you want in place?

And it's not at all clear, I don't think, that you end up with something super benign after that.

And it is a nuclear power, let's not forget that.

Let's not forget that.

And let's go to that, though, because the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the issue is not de-escalation when countries like our own have used de-escalation, but about stopping Iran from developing its nuclear capability, right?

That's his argument.

So just on a very military-only analysis, what Israel has done is just, oh my goodness, in terms of the sort of shock and awe and success of some parts of their military campaign, that's how I'm using the word success, to be quite clear, right?

But there's one problem, Jacob.

To actually not just disrupt and take backwards the nuclear capability, but to actually eliminate it, which clearly Netanyahu wants to do, and I think some other Western allies would probably like to be an outcome, the US must be drawn in.

The US is the only state that has the capability to take out particularly a couple of the sites that are deeper in the ground.

I'm just speaking in a very basic way, right?

About

what Israel needs.

Israel cannot complete this job.

on its own.

So this is a very big question now in terms of the US and for Donald Trump and his America First Strategy.

Will this draw the US in to so-called finish the job?

Will the President be able to convince Netanyahu

to come back to the negotiating table or at least allow the President to play that role to try and get a deal which limits Iran's ability to to

develop its nuclear capability.

This is a really big crossroads.

And

I mean he kind of got elected on the premise of getting, stopping these forever wars, not having new ones.

And so this is a really potentially dangerous decision for him as well, domestically, right?

Like I'm not so sure he's overwhelmingly worried about, you know, he might not have to face another election, but it's not kind of what he sold on the packet, Jacob, if he does get drawn in, right?

No, definitely not.

And he's, whether we sort of mock it or not, he does have sort of fantasies of having lasting peace in a place like Gaza.

You remember his sort of property developer video that he put out?

You know, so I think that is still part of his makeup.

It's as simple as he would love to win a Nobel Peace Prize.

I mean, let's not forget that's always sitting there in the background with this guy.

But also, America doesn't,

it's disruptive in so many ways.

And apart from the very terrible human impact that this is having, you see it already.

The oil price is on the way up.

The American president was elected on a promise to bring prices down for American consumers.

A big unending conflagration in the Middle East does not get you that.

It's the opposite.

And so those things are also front of mind for the president.

Now, it's another shock for our economic leadership in this country.

I'm going to speak to Jim Chalmers a little later today, and that's kind of a central question, really.

It's another hit, Jacob.

Like we have just, the world has been smashed by conflict after conflict in the last couple of years.

I agree.

And it, well, it'll, we'll have to wait and see on that, really, but that's the concern, isn't it?

That's what sits there as a sort of impact on our lives.

And you saw that with the war in Ukraine, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, that affected people here in Australia.

So, yeah.

Another one.

Another one.

Another one.

Now, I just want to say that as the Prime Minister prepares for this meeting, and I say prepares very deliberately, sure, he's busy meeting other people at the G7 sidelines, but

I can sort of say that with with authority and certainty that this meeting with Trump is pretty much consuming all of their bandwidth as they prepare.

I think they're lucky that it's not in the Oval Office where there'll be a sort of stripping down or some sort of ritual humiliation of another political leader.

Or it's not even that they get humiliated.

I was just thinking about

they humiliate themselves in a way.

Like I was looking at Keir starmer's meeting uh i was a couple of months now but remember when he pulled out that letter from the king inviting him so cringe a letter from the king inviting you you know to come because they knew that it would just

it was just frankly pathetic but but they knew it would work right that trump would go oh i'm getting a special meeting with the king

um and so it was used as a tactic Some would say, channeling other sort of voices to make sure that we are an incredibly, you know, multifaceted podcast.

Some would say, well, the UK's got a bit of a deal now when it comes to metals.

They have a lower tariff for the meanwhile till July where it comes up again.

But even that one, Patricia, is shaky.

Like, yeah, they might have got a deal, but none of the hardheads think it's a pretty good one.

Okay, there you go.

So, you know, like, yeah, you might play that card.

You might play that sort of sycophantic role and flatter the president, but I don't know.

I don't know if it really gets you a win.

I think our prime minister's doing the right thing he's he's I do too he's he's holding the line yeah you know I think actually voters in Australia would would react

in a certain way if he did play that card so well let me share this little little fact with you a new Lowy Institute poll has showed that 72% of respondents said they didn't trust Trump to act responsibly in global affairs just edging out the 71% who said they didn't trust China's Xi Jinping So yes, you heard that correctly.

I mean it's much of a muchness.

It's about the same level I would say.

But officially Trump is trusted less than the Chinese leader.

This is the kind of context in which our prime minister goes into that Trump meeting.

It also explains why it's so sensitive for him.

Yeah, he wants to make sure we don't lose out for

all the right reasons, but also you don't want to be near this guy.

I mean, he is toxic to politics.

It doesn't come

at any cost.

You know, it's, it's, yeah, to go back to what, you know, Malcolm Turnbull said to you, it's not any deal.

It's such an extraordinary situation, if you zoom out, that we are talking about our closest security and economic ally in these terms.

Yeah, that's right.

The only comfort I think you can take from it is the fact that it's true for everyone and it's actually much worse for a lot of other allies.

Look, Jacob, final little observation that I would like you to make.

I can make one too, but mainly you.

I'm definitely not a therapist, although I wouldn't mind dabbling sometimes.

But the PM looked a little stressed just in the images of him.

Do you reckon he's feeling a little

like it's sort of big weight on him having to do this meeting with this?

Well, you know, I don't know.

I think it's his job.

I know, I know, but he's

a meeting.

Look, I think you can see that it's definitely weighing on him.

He's had a busy year, you know, winning an election.

And now it's a reckoning, it's a meeting.

He's known about this meeting for months and months and months.

Like, the election has meant that it didn't happen as soon as it might have in a normal sort of set of circumstances.

He's been thinking about it, I know, since the very beginning of the year.

And I wrote about this, when he looked at a tweet that Donald Trump had written about the California governor, Gavin Newsome, called him Gavin Newscomb.

That was when the Californian fires were on.

And I know that,

you know, the Prime Minister saw that and was amazed by that, that that sort of language gets used.

So it's been weighing on him for a while.

And this is the big test.

He's finally going to get the meeting.

It was amazing to me last week that we didn't know whether a meeting was happening.

I mean, this is kind of wild stuff between allies that you can't even even be sure the meeting's going to happen.

And quite frankly, you know, anything could still happen with this bloke.

Oh, totally.

And that's how he likes to play it, by the way.

He does that on purpose because that insecurity he feels plays to his strength.

He can then, you know, play the game on the other side.

Yeah, his whole vibe is he gets an advantage from you kind of jumping around, shadow boxing, right?

Yep.

Yep.

It's absolutely wild.

Oh, Jacob,

what a cathartic podcast this has been.

As I say, more and more stories breaking and of course stay with ABC News as we're bringing them to you, but I just despair looking at what's happening in the Middle East, really.

I think about people who have absolutely no agency for how their governments behave and they're just often the kind of silent victims of all of this.

Well that's it for politics now today.

I'll be back to answer your questions on Thursday with France, so send those in the partyroom at abc.net.au and Brett Worthington joins me tomorrow for another episode and there'll be a lot more to talk about.

See you, Jacob.

Take care, Pika.