The embarrassing way Penny Wong found out Australia would not be exempt from Donald Trump’s tariffs

Australia’s foreign minister Penny Wong has admitted she only found out the US had slapped tariffs on Australian steel and aluminium through the media.

Donald Trump’s press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed the tariffs to reporters in her White House office before Senator Wong and, reportedly, Australia’s ambassador to the US Kevin Rudd had even been told. 

‘That was when I first heard confirmation of the reports,’ Ms Wong confirmed while speaking to Nine’s Today program on Thursday. 

Host Sarah Abo described the fact the US did not bother to inform Australia through official channels first as ‘humiliating’ for the foreign minister. 

But Ms Wong said she had never expected Australia would be exempted from the 25 per cent tariffs given the Trump administration said previous exclusions had been a mistake.

‘We had a much harder hill to climb. ‘We obviously knew we had a very difficult set of negotiations, we threw everything at it. But we did understand that fundamentally,’ she said. 

It is unclear when Prime Minister Anthony Albanese found out about the tariffs, but news.com.au reported that Ambassador Rudd had also been blindsided by the news and had assumed his discussions with US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick were ongoing. 

Ms Leavitt confirmed on Wednesday that Australia would not be exempted to Nine Newspapers’ Michael Koziol and the ABC’s Carrington Clarke, who quizzed her on the tariffs in her office. 

Ms Wong told Seven’s Sunrise program the government and Prime Minister had done everything they could to secure exemptions for Australia.

‘It’s pretty clear that the government from the Prime Minister down has been working overtime to try and land this deal,’ she said.

‘The White House has said the exemption that they gave last time to Australia and other countries was a mistake and so this time they were very clear that they didn’t want any exemptions.’

Ms Wong said that the tariffs would affect American consumers and the Australian government was not considering retaliatory tariffs against the US as it would increase the cost of goods for Australians. 

‘Tariffs are a tax and they make things more expensive for the people buying,’ she said.

While US consumers will have to pay more for goods made with imported products, commentators have said President Trump is trying to encourage the growth of domestic manufacturing.

He is also using the tariffs as a tool to apply pressure over other issues, such as encouraging Mexico and Canada to help stem the flow of illegal immigrants.

When asked if the government was concerned other industries such as Australia’s beef exports would be next to be targetted by President Trump’s tariffs, Ms Wong said she hoped that would not be the case.

‘Australian beef enters the United States market under a free trade agreement that’s been in place for a very long time as a friend and ally. 

‘We want to continue to see that free trade agreement on it. That’s what we want.’ 

Shadow Trade Minister Kevin Hogan previously accused the Prime Minister of failing to make a proper effort to establish a strong relationship with the US president.

Mr Hogan said Mr Albanese was the only Quad leader who had never met Mr Trump in person – Japanese PM Shigeru Ishiba and Indian PM Narendra Modi both met him last month – and that a meet-and-greet was the ‘bare minimum’ he could have done. 

Mr Albanese did congratulate Mr Trump on the phone after his November election victory and spoke to him in February – again via phone – to argue Australia’s case to be exempt from trade tariffs.

At the time, Mr Trump said he would give ‘great consideration’ to the request. 

However, on Wednesday, it was revealed Mr Albanese repeatedly tried to phone Mr Trump directly ahead of the tariff announcement but he did not answer his calls.   

The US President’s decision comes after former Liberal Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull this week attacked Mr Trump in interviews with Daily Mail Australia, Bloomberg, the ABC and Nine Newspapers. 

Mr Turnbull, who was in office during Mr Trump’s last presidency when Australia did get an exemption on trade tariffs, said accused the president of being ‘unpredictable’, a ‘bully’ and having a ‘huge ego’. 

Mr Trump fired a shot back at Mr Turnbull on his Truth Social network, labelling him a ‘weak and ineffective leader’ who ‘never understood what was going on in China’.

Mr Hogan argued Australia might have avoided the tariff hit if we had established a better friendship with Mr Trump since he took office for his second term.

‘Albanese has not shown a great interest in the relationship,’ he said.

‘The US is an important economic partner, but also an important national security partner and Albanese has not lifted this relationship. 

‘The importance of going over and developing a rapport with him… I would have thought that was the the minimal thing he should have done to help with negotiations with this.’

Mr Hogan pointed out Australia has just made an $800million payment to the US towards the AUKUS security pact.

‘Richard Marles was over there a few weeks ago. There’s national security issues that weren’t live then. We have some critical minerals that are important to them,’ he said. 

‘Show that you value the relationship by the prime minister travelling over there and spending personal time.

‘He seems to have really only had one serious phone conversation with our most important ally… that’s really disappointing.’

The levies on steel and aluminium apply to all trading partners of the US ‘with no exceptions or exemptions’ and took effect from Wednesday.