Malcolm Turnbull and US President Donald Trump’s infamous phone call leaked to the Washington Post two years ago could play a role in looming impeachment hearings in Washington.
The President’s former chief strategist Steve Bannon has told The Australian the phone call and the impeachment hearings are “inextricably linked” after its leaking to the media allegedly changed White House processes.
The heated call saw then Prime Minister Turnbull and President Trump clash over a refugee transfer deal Australia had brokered with the Obama administration for refugees on Nauru and Manus Island.
Mr Bannon said Republicans will argue the leaking of the call was the reason for transcripts of conversations between the US President and foreign leaders now being restricted by the White House.
Mr Trump’s impeachment proceedings centre around another phone call with a foreign leader - Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky - in which a transcript of their conversation was placed on a secure server.
President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull. Source: EPA
Democrats plan to argue the decision to initially place the call on a classified server was an attempt to hide its contents, despite the White House later releasing a partial transcript of the conversation.
Mr Bannon said treating records of the call in this manner was in line with rules put in place after President Trump's phone call with Mr Turnbull.
“100 per cent – it comes directly from the Turnbull phone call,” he told The Australian.
Mr Trump has called the impeachment probe against him a political witch hunt. The President is accused of withholding aid to compel the Ukranian President Zelensky to mount a corruption probe against election Democratic election rival Joe Biden during their phone call.
Democrats have pushed forward impeachment proceedings against US President Donald Trump with a public phase of the inquiry soon to begin.
Mr Bannon says the Turnbull-Trump call changed White House procedures because it believed too many people had access to records of such calls.
The two leaders heated phone call in 2017 captured international headlines. Source: EPA
The move was designed to make leaders feel they could have “open and direct conversations” with the US President without fear of them being leaked.
In their 2017 call, Mr Turnbull and President Trump clashed over whether the United States would uphold a refugee agreement involving resettling refugees from Nauru and Manus island in the US.
President Trump had called the deal “terrible”, “foolish” and a “killer” - concerned it would make him look like a “weak” and “ineffective leader".
A transcript of the call was leaked to the Washington Post prompting international headlines about the leaders’ perceived disagreement.
