Australian ambassador to US deleted messages about ‘traitor’ Trump ahead of election win, report says

Kevin Rudd, the Australian ambassador to the United States, deleted tweets criticizing Donald Trump in the campaign’s final week.

Rudd, the former Australian prime minister, scrubbed his X page of past anti-Trump remarks days before the Republican clinched the 2024 election on Wednesday morning, according to The Sydney Morning Herald.

He took down posts that referred to Trump as “the most destructive president in history” and as a “traitor to the West,” the outlet reported.

In a now-deleted post from June 2020, memorialized in a screenshot by Sky News Australia, Rudd responded to an article about how the Bishop of the Washington Diocese was “outraged over Trump’s photo-op” with a bible. The controversial stunt, at the height of the Black Lives Matter protests, saw Trump pose with a Bible outside a DC church, sparking widespread anger.

Rudd tweeted: “The most destructive president in history. He drags America and democracy through the mud. He thrives on fomenting, not healing, division. He abuses Christianity, church and bible to justify violence. All aided and abetted by Murdoch’s FoxNews network in America which feeds this.”

By Wednesday, Rudd was posting to a different tune entirely.

He congratulated Trump on his election victory in a statement posted on X: “Australians and Americans are long-standing friends, partners and allies. Our nations and peoples are bound by a history of shared values, shared sacrifice and shared opportunity. These deep bonds of true and enduring friendship between us will also shape our common future.”

The statement continued: “Australia looks forward to working closely with President Trump and his Administration on the challenges and opportunities that our two great democracies and the wider world will face in the years ahead.”

When asked by The Sydney Morning Herald about the deleted social media posts, Rudd’s office said in a statement that he had been “a regular commentator on American politics” while working at a US-based think tank and that comments had been removed “out of respect for the office of President of the United States, and following the election of President Trump.”

“This has been done to eliminate the possibility of such comments being misconstrued as reflecting his positions as ambassador and, by extension, the views of the Australian government,” the statement continued. “Ambassador Rudd looks forward to working with President Trump and his team to continue strengthening the US-Australia alliance.”

In an interview with UK Member of Parliament Nigel Farage in March, Trump responded to some of Rudd’s comments.

“He won’t be there long if that’s the case. I don’t know much about him. I heard he was a little bit nasty,” the former president said. “I hear he’s not the brightest bulb, but I don’t know much about him. If he’s at all hostile he will not be there long.”