Since USSC’s last polling in August 2025, some developments that one could assume would impact Australian views of the United States include a US executive order that could dramatically drive up the costs of Australian pharmaceuticals, US military strikes on alleged drug traffickers in the Caribbean Sea, the release of US national security documents prioritising the Western Hemisphere over the Indo-Pacific, US intervention in Venezuela capturing President Nicolas Maduro, and perhaps most notably, a US intervention in Iran that has prompted the largest energy crisis in decades.
Despite such major events, Australian perceptions of the US remain remarkably consistent from last year’s polling
Yet despite such major events, Australian perceptions of the US remain remarkably consistent from last year’s polling. For a second year in a row, only 16% of Australians think the second Trump term has been good for Australia while the majority think it has been bad or very bad for Australia (58%, an increase from 56%). Also identical or within the margin of error to last year’s polling of Australians: the mere 15% who support abandoning the US alliance, the 30% who say that the US is a danger to Australia, and the 49% who say that “Australia needs its alliance with the United States more than ever” (more than two times the size of the 20% who disagree).
Harold Macmillan, the UK Prime Minister from 1957-1963, when reportedly asked what he worried most about, said “Events, my dear boy, events”. Multi-country polling faces similar challenges, particularly during a Trump administration that has been successful in dominating news coverage and rapidly changing the tone of US relations with ally and adversary alike through countless events.
Major developments can not only lead to dramatic swings in public opinion, but also risks the publication of such polls to be considered stale and overtaken by events only a few months or even weeks after they were conducted.
Such consistency in Australian opinions about the United States perhaps is not despite such events but actually because of them. In an era of increased geopolitics, Australians remain keen to stick with what works and, for most of them, the US alliance has continued to work despite their significant misgivings about the US political leadership.
Australians remain keen to stick with what works and, for most of them, the US alliance has continued to work despite their significant misgivings about the US political leadership.
More than a century before Macmillan became Prime Minister, a different British politician, then-Foreign Secretary Henry John Temple, articulated his nation’s foreign policy in the House of Commons in a way that remains apt to this day, “We have no eternal allies, and we have no perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual, and those interests it is our duty to follow."
As Americans celebrate 250 years of independence, Australians undoubtedly have concerns about the United States and even US democracy. Yet the steadiness of Australian opinion is a telling measure of the state of the alliance – a relationship Australians are not judging by any single administration, but by long-term national interests. Such interests appear more event-proof than ever.
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