MARK RILEY: Ahead of his crucial meet with Trump, Albanese faces a US attention span challenge

Anthony Albanese’s last visit to the White House was a glitzy affair.

He was welcomed with all the bells and whistles. Quite literally.

The Old Guard Fife and Drum Corps, resplendent in their Continental Army red coats, black tricorn hats and white trousers, marched a captivating troop step along the length of the South Lawn while greeting the visiting Australian leader with a rousing version of Yankee Doodle Dandy.

It was an overwhelmingly American moment.

That night, president Joe Biden hosted an official black-tie dinner in a special marquee erected on the lawns.

The first lady, Jill Biden, had arranged for 80s pop icons the B52s to get back together for the event and belt out a set of their dance-floor hits.

But B52 was 86ed.

The date of the White House shindig was October 23, 2023. That was just 16 days after Hamas massacred 1195 people in its hateful attacks on Israel.

It was also on the night Benjamin Netanyahu was preparing to launch his all-out ground assault on Gaza.

This was no time for writhing to Rock Lobster.

In his speech marking the occasion, Biden recognised “the anger, the hurt, the sense of outrage that the Israeli people are feeling”.

And while supporting Israel’s “right, and I would add responsibility to respond to the slaughter of its people” Biden said that the only long term way forward was to seek a two-state solution.

The White House welcome for Anthony Albanese in the early hours of Tuesday, Australian time, will be very different.

There will be none of the razzamatazz.

For Australia, the upcoming meet is extremely important

And the President he meets will be basking in the world’s adulation for finally bringing a fragile peace to the Middle East, with no intention of pursuing the two-state solution so strongly backed by Biden, Albanese and the vast majority of the international community.

The hostages who were taken by Hamas while Biden was president are now being released into a world where Trump is without doubt the dominant and most powerful political figure.

Albanese’s White House visits bookend that extraordinary transition in a way that is coincidental but also poignant.

He will have been there when the war started under Biden and hopefully ended under Trump.

But while the Prime Minister’s visit this time will attract blanket coverage in Australia, it will rate barely a blip in a US political news cycle dominated by much larger matters.

Early on Saturday, Australian time, Trump will welcome Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky back to the White House as the US President now turns his attention towards forcing a peace deal on Russia.

The speculation in Washington is that Trump will reverse his previous opposition to supplying Ukraine with long-range Tomahawk missiles that have the capability of striking deep into Russian territory.

That would send an emphatic message to Vladimir Putin that Trump has had enough of his games.

Either the Russian leader agrees to enter meaningful peace talks or he’ll face the prospect of a devastating proxy war with the US.

As a strong supporter of Ukraine, Albanese is sure to back any decision by Trump to increase the US’s military support.

With such tectonic matters at play, it is likely that Trump will ration the amount of time he spends on matters related to the alliance with Australia.

But for Australia, there are significant issues to discuss. Albanese will dangle access to our abundant stores of critical minerals as an incentive for Trump to ease his punishing tariffs on steel, aluminium and pharmaceuticals.

That should be persuasive. China’s recently imposed export controls on its critical minerals mean America can’t rely on it as a supplier. That leaves Australia as the logical, reliable export partner of choice.

And Albanese will go armed with another big cheque — this one for $1.5 billion — as a further contribution to the expansion of America’s defence industrial base in line with our commitments under AUKUS.

In return, the Prime Minister will want a simple public declaration from Trump that he supports AUKUS for the long term.

There is a good chance that Albanese will be able to secure commitments on both tariffs and AUKUS.

And if that happens in a brief no-frills visit to the White House rather than all the hoopla of a South Lawn Revolutionary War re-enactment, the Prime Minister will still be happier than a rock lobster in a love shack.

Mark Riley is the Seven Network’s political editor