MARK RILEY: Donald Trump’s schooling of Kevin Rudd left a mark, but in Albanese’s arms he has no fear

Being in the White House Cabinet Room while Donald Trump is conducting one of his appropriately named media “sprays” is a bit like being on the set of The Apprentice.

In fact, it is a lot like it.

Trump holds court from his seat at the middle of the long table, luxuriating in the self-inflating knowledge that everyone in the room and at the other end of the live television feed is entirely focused on him.

This is a guy who fills the room the moment he enters it.

He is the centre of attention, the host and star of his own political reality show.

And anyone who takes him on, or disappoints him, risks an eviscerating Trump takedown.

“You’re fired!” he’d famously thunder in his reality TV days.

Now it’s “You’re nasty!” or a dismissive “Quiet!” to persistent or impertinent questioners.

Trump turned on a couple of the Australian journalists in the room on Tuesday when Anthony Albanese was the special guest on The White House Apprentice.

But his targeting of Australian Ambassador and former prime minister Kevin Rudd was the headline-grabbing moment.

Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky has copped it, so has South African leader Cyril Ramaphosa.

Tuesday was Rudd’s turn.

Trump at first claimed to not know who Rudd was. This is questionable. We have subsequently discovered that everyone in that room — including we journalists — had been vetted by the White House before our arrival.

The President had been comprehensively briefed on all the issues that were likely to be raised by Albanese, the travelling media and anyone else in the room.

Surely that included the fact that Rudd would be sitting across the table from him?

But just like when Nigel Farage first asked Trump about Rudd’s previous description of him as “the most destructive President in US history” and “a village idiot”, the property billionaire turned leader of the free world claimed to have no idea who the Australian ambassador was.

And again like in the Farage television interview in March last year, Trump laid into Rudd anyway.

When asked by Sky News’ Andrew Clennell whether the ambassador’s comments about him were partly the reason for the apparent delay in meeting Albanese, Trump took the bait.

He asked where Rudd was and Albanese coughed his former boss, pointing at him across the table.

Then came the viral moment, with Trump training his finger on Rudd and snarling: “I don’t like you either. And I probably never will!”

The Cabinet Room filled with laughter at first, but it quickly subsided as those of us present began to wonder whether this was performative or real.

Albanese insisted it was the former. The President was overhead telling Rudd “All is forgiven” as we left the room after the encounter.

Of course, Rudd wasn’t the only one in that room who had said negative things about Trump during his first presidency.

JD Vance had. And he is now Vice President. So had Marco Rubio. He’s now Secretary of State. And let’s not forget Albanese himself. He once said Trump “scares the shit out of me”.

The Prime Minister is probably lucky the question wasn’t about his comments and not Rudd’s.

Either way, there’s no chance Albanese will sack Rudd. They are close. And there is history. When Rudd returned briefly to the prime ministership before the 2013 election, Albanese was his deputy, having tearfully abandoned Julia Gillard.

Albanese spent much of his second and final day in Washington defending Rudd and talking up his effectiveness as Australia’s representative.

He described him as the hardest working ambassador on Capitol Hill. Mike McCall, the Republican co-chair of the Congressional Friends of Australia Caucus, endorsed that.

McCall credited Rudd with single-handedly shepherding the various AUKUS bills through Congress that had buttressed Trump’s significant public declaration this week of long-term support for the agreement.

“I’m glad you’re still gainfully employed!” McCall quipped to much genuine laughter at a Friends of Australia Caucus event at our Washington Embassy.

“If there’s a harder worker on the hill, then please let me know and get them care. Because Kevin works his guts out!” Albanese added.

He does. And he will continue to do so, despite Opposition Leader Sussan Ley’s demands for his sacking.

Kevin Rudd won’t hear: “You’re fired!” But he’ll still be a little bruised after his Trump thumping on the White House Apprentice. And quite a show it was.

Mark Riley is the Seven Network’s political editor