Anthony Pratt has revealed his superpower. It is something that is striking, unmatched and hard to come by. It helps him touch every corner of the earth and shake hands with the most powerful people on the planet.
It’s his $15.8 billion AUD net worth.
Nine media recently acquired secret tapes recording Anthony Pratt, owner of the billion-dollar packaging company Pratt Holdings. The recordings reveal much about his relationships with former US President Donald Trump, his lawyer Rudy Giuliani, even King Charles III.
But it also sparks questions surrounding money, politics and power and casts doubt over the integrity of the political systems in both Australia and the US.
What are political donations?
People giving money to political parties or campaigns is nothing new. In the 2021-2022 financial year, Anthony Pratt was the second largest donor, giving nearly $4 million AUD.
It wasn’t nearly as much as Mineralogy Pty Ltd, donating a total of $117.1 million AUD, all of which went to Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party.
But payments aren’t always made with an ulterior motive, explains Dr Catherine Williams, research director at the Centre for Public Integrity. In theory, political donations are indicative of a working democratic society.
“Political donations are payments that are made for no consideration or inadequate consideration to political parties,” she says.
“A person or an organisation might donate to a party or candidate whose policy positions or values they support. Where these donations are in small amounts, that’s reflective of a thriving democracy.
“When you get small amounts being contributed by members of the community, you know the populace is engaged in its democracy.”
All political donations above the disclosure threshold, which this financial year is indexed to $16,300, must be reported to the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC)’s Transparency Register.
“The difficulty comes with these really substantial amounts of money,” Dr Williams continues.
“What the people who are making those payments might be doing is seeking to have either favourable decisions made about permit applications that they might be making, or to enable them to have privileged access to the political process.”
"Society should reconsider whether politicians should further receive retirement benefits given some take up lucrative lobbying jobs, a director of the Centre for Public Integrity, barrister Geoffrey Watson, SC"https://t.co/2Xj6FXyqjR
— The Centre For Public Integrity (@cpi_aus) October 24, 2023
Political donations in the 2022 Federal Election
In February this year, The Guardian reported the top ten political donors in the last financial year accounted for 77 per cent of all political donations, totalling around $137 million.
The largest donors came from fossil fuel, gambling and alcohol companies. According to the Grattan Institute, most of the major donors to the Coalition were wealthy individuals and corporate donations.
The Australian Conservation Foundation reported that, in the lead up to the 2022 Australian federal election in May last year, fossil fuel companies donated more to Labor ($1.4 million) than to Coalition parties ($900,000). The organisation’s analysis attributed this change to the companies “sensing a change in government”.
Campaigns for Australia’s latest referendum on an Indigenous Voice to Parliament, which failed with a majority No vote from the public, also received a number of political donations.
In April this year, The Australian Financial Review reported that the Yes campaign received $17 million from more than 20 of Australia’s richest philanthropists and family foundations, including the Besen Foundation, Jo Horgan’s Mecca M Power and The Myer Foundation.
Meanwhile, Advance, the conservative political group spearheading the No campaign, was backed by former fund manager Simon Fenwick, who donated $250,000. Sydney millionaire Rodney O’Neil, whose family generates profit in building material with Australian Blue Metal, Hymix and other companies, also donated around $85,000 last year.
There are a number of other donors – on both campaign sides of the referendum – and the full amount that was donated won’t be known until April next year.
Dr Williams from the Centre of Public Integrity says large donations made from wealthy individuals or organisations can have a “corrosive impact on public trust”, particularly since there is no spending cap on donations.
“They (the public) might perceive decisions made favourable to these persons to be a consequence of those donations,” she says.
“There’s also the potential for electoral outcomes to be distorted because of the absence of a spending cap.
“So we’re in this situation whereby the more donations you can get, the more money you can spend and, potentially, you can distort the election outcome.”
Anthony Pratt
On October 5, the world discovered former US President Donald Trump had reportedly revealed national security secrets to at least 45 other unauthorised people.
One of those people was Australian billionaire Anthony Pratt.
This week, Donald Trump took to his social media platform Truth Social, rejecting the claims as “fake news”. He called Pratt “a red haired weirdo from Australia” and said he never revealed those secrets to him.
It’s a far cry from how Trump has previously spoken of Pratt – a “friend”, a “great gentleman”, even “Australia’s most successful man”.
While it’s difficult to confirm for sure what changed, Nine media acquired secret recordings of Anthony Pratt discussing how he has accessed the power of Donald Trump, Rudy Giuliani, King Charles III and more through his own superpower – “being rich”.
Although Pratt likened Trump and Giuliani to “the mafia”, investigative journalist from The Age Nick McKenzie said that title is an expression of Pratt as a “fanboy” of their power.
“That’s not a condemnation – he thinks that’s kind of cool because they’re powerful. Nobody messes with them. They take no prisoners,” McKenzie said in Nine media’s Please Explain podcast.
“This is a study of power, and what the powerful say when they think no one is listening. That’s why it’s so revealing.”
A report on Nine’s current affairs program 60 Minutes revealed Pratt once paid Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s “killer lawyer” and right-hand man, $1 million to attend his 60th birthday party in Melbourne.
Why? Because, as Pratt said in the tapes: “Rudy is someone who I hope will be useful one day.”
“We suspect the wealthy and powerful in the business world seek these relationships for their own interests,” McKenzie said in the Please Explain podcast.
“We can see it happening sometimes from a distance, but very rarely do we see these very powerful business people explain albeit while they’re not knowing they’re being recorded, about what it is that they’re actually seeking in their own words.”
Richard Baker from The Age suggested Pratt uses his money in this way for the “rub-off effect” of being close to Giuliani.
“Anyone who wants to go after Pratt or take him on might find that he can stick Giuliani onto them… so there’s a protective thing there as well,” he said in the podcast.
“Giuliani also – I guess just by being plugged into the Trump network when Trump was in the White House – got access to all sorts of information, that could be valuable in a business sense, in a personal sense, because he was that close to power himself and he was an attack dog for the President.
“And this billionaire was hoping that if he needed him, he could do the same for him.”
Access to Giuliani means, by default, access to Trump. The covert tapes obtained by Nine media revealed Trump told Pratt of various state secrets, including the ordering of an airstrike on Iranian-linked militants in Iraq in 2019, as well as the phone call between Trump and Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy asking him to investigate Joe Biden’s son Hunter.
With his money, power and influence, it seems Pratt ensured all ground was covered. Nine media’s sources indicate Pratt paid $182,000 in 2021 to then Prince Charles, now King Charles III.
On home soil, Pratt reportedly made consulting payments of $25,000 a month to Paul Keating, the former Prime Minister of Australia. He also paid former Prime Minister Tony Abbott $8,000 a month.
McKenzie from The Age said in the Please Explain podcast the payments to the political figures means something, including shaping both the political and the media narrative.
“It does suggest a pattern that Pratt wants to get very influential political heavy weights close to him,” he said.
“That should lead voters in Australia, the United States, to question why it is that billionaires align themselves with politicians and leaders. Is it because they genuinely think they’re great leaders? Or because there’s some other interest at play?”