“Don’t worry, Malcolm. The American people will never elect a lunatic to sit in this office,” Mr Obama is reported as saying in Mr Turnbull’s new book, A Bigger Picture. But with Mr Trump in power, the prime minister chose to approach him as a billionaire rather than a traditional politician and stick to Australia’s position on the refugee deal agreed with Mr Obama in 2016. Mr Turnbull reveals the agreement was largely settled in September 2016 but only announced on November 13, five days after the US election, in part to prevent Mr Trump turning it into an election issue. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull meets with United States of America President Donald Trump in the Oval Office in 2018. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen “I spoke with Trump’s incoming chief of staff, Reince Priebus, on 7 December and he gave me every impression they’d stick with the deal,” Mr Turnbull writes, adding that he received a similar assurance from Mr Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.

But hours before the phone call in January 2017, US Vice President Mike Pence called then foreign minister Julie Bishop and told her the President had changed his mind and Mr Turnbull should not mention it. “As his anger rose, Trump kept talking over the top of me, with more intensity,” Mr Turnbull writes of the phone call. Don't worry, Malcolm. The American people will never elect a lunatic to sit in this office. Barack Obama to Malcolm Turnbull before the 2016 US election “It was as though at times he was talking to himself or perhaps to the people in the room, which of course included [then presidential adviser] Steve Bannon, one of the deal’s fiercest opponents. “At one point, I looked up from the phone across my desk to [senior adviser] David Bold – his face was white with horror – so I turned to look out the window instead.”

When an account of the conversation was leaked to the US media, Mr Turnbull assumed the source was Mr Bannon attempting to block the deal or distance the President from it. Yet the conflict was smoothed over when Mr Turnbull flew to New York in May 2017 to meet Mr Trump at a ceremony to commemorate the Battle of the Coral Sea, where the influence of News Corp chairman Rupert Murdoch was also apparent. Rupert Murdoch embraces President Trump in 2017 at a dinner honoring veterans who served in the Battle of the Coral Sea. Credit:Al Drago/The New York Times “When Trump arrived, he was accompanied by [former New York mayor] Rudy Giuliani and Rupert Murdoch,” Mr Turnbull writes. “His deference to Murdoch was greater than I’ve ever seen from any Australian politician and was in marked contrast to the high-handed way Trump treats most people.

“When he asked me if Rupert could join us for our bilateral discussion between leaders, I told him that wasn’t a good idea. “He talked about Kerry Packer a lot; he knew I’d been Kerry’s lawyer and ‘kept him out of jail’, something Donald mentioned every time we met.” When Mr Trump asked his wife, Melania, to join the talks, he joked with Mr Turnbull about the refugee deal he had been so angry about months earlier. “Melania, do you know, Malcolm has 2000 of the worst terrorists in the world locked up on a desert island and that fool Obama agreed to take them?” Mr Trump said, according to the new memoir.

“And now Malcolm has talked me into taking them, too.” Loading Mr Turnbull notes that while the conversation was “surreal”, the deal meant refugees would soon begin leaving the islands to resettle in the US. The next source of tension was trade, with Mr Trump slapping tariffs on imported steel and aluminium, and Mr Turnbull using a global summit in Hamburg in 2017 to try to gain an Australian exemption. While those talks came weeks after Mr Turnbull had impersonated Mr Trump at the Canberra press gallery’s Mid Winter Ball, there was no complaint from the President.

“So, you’ve been having a little fun at my expense, Malcolm?” he said, according to Mr Turnbull’s account. “It’s not bad. Lots of people think you are better than Alec Baldwin." Loading In a meeting in a secure facility in Hamburg, Mr Trump agreed to give Australia an exemption from his proposed tariffs on Canada and European allies, but only after repeating what Mr Turnbull called a “routine” about the refugee deal. As French President Emmanuel Macron listened, Mr Turnbull told Mr Trump – “wearily” – that the refugees were not terrorists. “Oh, yes, they are,” Mr Trump replied, in Mr Turnbull's account. “They are the worst, and that fool Obama – the worst president EVER – agreed to take them to America. Can you believe that? Would you take them, Emmanuel?”