The Chaser Report - The Pratt Files

Episode Date: October 24, 2023

Pratt by name, prat by nature. Dom and Charles discuss Anthony Pratt's recently released tapes, regarding his connections to Donald Trump and King Charles III and why his superpower is being rich. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Chaser Report is recorded on Gadigal Land. Striving for mediocrity in a world of excellence, this is the Chaser Report. Hello and welcome to The Chaser Report with Dom and Dom, what's your hook for today's podcast? Yes, well, Charles, the reason why people should listen to this is because we have today the story of how Australia's weirdest billionaire. I didn't even know that he was Australia's weirdest billionaire until this story came out. Anthony Pratt. Anthony Pratt. The heir to the Vizzy Cardboard Box Empire

might bring down not just Donald Trump but also the king. The King of England. Both Donald Trump and the King of England and he's done it by exercising his and I quote, superpower. What is his superpower? Before we get on about Charles, what do you think yours is?

What's your superpower? What's your special source? Well, my, I mean, I've got a special superpower in losing money. Yeah, you actually really do. I find that other, especially institutions like banks seem to make an enormous amount of money out of me. They do. As to many people you've worked with and sort of giving a leg up over you in terms of celebrity.

That's true. I think my super power is being able to survive with no sleep. Oh, yes. Yeah, with the young children, I've never slept more than four or five hours a night. I'm always miserable, but I keep battling on. I've always thought that you probably, the reason why nobody notices the difference. between Dom with sleep and Dom without sleep is because you're grumpy,

regardless of how much sleep you get. No, no, I'm not grumpy if I get lots of sleep. It's just the last time I got lots of sleep was when I was 20. Oh, right. Yes, I didn't know there was a non-brumby dom. Yeah, there was about a year there when I was really happening. Anyway, so Anthony Pratt,

and this is something that he said on a secret recording he didn't know he's being taped. He said this without apparently any self-awareness. My superpower is that I'm rich. How did he deploy this superpower to potentially destroy the president of the king? After this. Thank you for your patience. Your call is important.

Can't take being on hold anymore? FIS is 100% online, so you can make the switch in minutes. Mobile plans start at $15 a month. Certain conditions apply. Details at FIS.ca. Okay, so before we get into the distraction of Western civilization, as we know it, Can we just reflect on what it must be like to be Anthony Pratt? Yes.

Aird to a cardboard box fortune. Because I get it. Like, airs are going to be fucked up anyway. Yeah. And they tend to destroy the businesses that they've inherited as a general rule. Yeah. Especially if your name's Pratt. Yeah.

It's a big burden to carry. To be heir to a fortune is one thing. But at some level, you know, even with a Jamie Packer or a Lachlan Murdoch, like, you're an idiot, right. But at least you are related to somebody who. who wielded power and influence and build up really quite an extraordinary and dynamic and dynastic sense of power and fortunate like you were you were in the court of somebody truly great

on the other hand if you're Anthony Pratt sure you're a billionaire but your dad made it out of cardboard boxes and he did it Charles with not just the surname Pratt but the first name Dick he went through life as Dick Pratt Well, that's probably why he had to become a billionaire. And when he died, he was Australia's fourth richest person. Oh, really? Worth five and a half billion dollars.

He was the one who had all the mistresses, wasn't it? Yes, yes. He had Sherrily, Hitchcock, I think. He basically impregnated behind his wife's back. And there's a whole, I think the lawsuit continues with the daughter. You would, though, wouldn't you? If you were worth $5.5 billion. Yeah, and your name was Dick Pratt.

Maybe his mission was to have so many children that there was a majority, whereby Pratt was no longer an embarrassing name to have, except that it still would have been. So here's the thing. This is a man, and I'm not making this up, Charles. This is a man whom Donald Trump described as a red-headed weirdo. And when you look at the two of them together, please look at the Guardian's got a photo.

Look at a photo of the two of them together. It is absolutely true that Anthony Pratt, who I think is actually a genuine billionaire, unlike Donald Trump. He looks a lot weird. His hair is weirder. Yes. It's as though he saw Trump's hairstyle and went, hold my die bottle. I think I can do better.

He could easily be an aged Ronald McDonald. You're right. In the photo, Donald Trump looks totally normal. He does. By comparison to Anthony Pratt. He should hire Anthony Pratt to walk around with him. I think the way that it works is Anthony Pratt would hire Donald Trump. Oh, okay. So Anthony Pratt, trying to build his business up and sort of keep it alive, he has grown it up. And you might remember a very strange moment during the, remember the Scott Morrison era?

Oh, yes. Yes. There was a time when Donald Trump, Anthony Pratt and Scott Morrison all gathered at a cardboard box factory in I think Ohio because they were opening a new busy kind of headquarters in the US there and trumpeting how great Australian business was and Trump was there and so on it turns out that there's a great way to get Donald Trump to turn up to things like that and to basically hang out with you donate to his campaign is no no no donate to him donate to him you join Mara Lago and so this is what Anthony Pratt has been doing he's been moving around and basically paying for access to things.

And somehow, the Sydney Morning Herald and age managed to record all this stuff that he said about Donald Trump and everybody else. How is that legal? I have no idea. But some of the things that he has said, and it is just, it is an absolute cavalcade of great shit that he has said. I kind of like Anthony Pratt because he's just, he is so frank and so I don't give a shit. Yeah, well, you would if you had a billion dollars.

He's got several. Let me tell you some of the things that he said that were recorded on the tapes. He told, and this is the thing that made in you. in the US a couple of days ago. Pratt claimed that Trump told him in 2019 that he was going to order an airstrike on Iranian-linked militants in Iraq before it hit the headlines. And apparently Iraq's president rang Trump. According to Pratt, Trump responded. And I said to him, OK, what are you going to do about it? So he's boasting about killing people, basically. Wow. That's one thing. He also, Pratt says that Trump told him about the call for which he was

impeached, the call to Vladimir Zelensky, trying to get dirt on Joe Biden. Oh, wow. And Pratt, kind of commented on that, and Trump said, you know that Ukraine phone call, that was nothing compared to what I usually do. There are so many things here. Pratt says the genius of Trump is that he knows exactly how to stay out of jail. That might be out of date now, but by getting other people to do illegal things for him. So he doesn't go and order the illegal thing. He asks an underling, like Michael Cohen, to go and order the illegal thing, or the CFO,

Alan Weisselberg of the Trump Organization, who's been in legal trouble too. There's that. He also, this is the weirdest one to me, because you'd think that a billionaire would know the value of money a little bit, right? Yes. Apparently, he boasted on the tape of paying about a million bucks to Rudy Giuliani to attend his birthday party, to which Rudy Giuliani didn't turn up, apparently. So he paid a million bucks for Rudy to come to your birthday party.

He doesn't even show up. And Pratt said, I think he'll be useful someday. Dom, I think we should befriend this Anthony Bradshaw. We should. We absolutely should. It's so hilarious. Let's play a little bit of the audio here. I didn't even heard it.

You hadn't even been on the news. He said, I just bombed Europe today. And the president of Iraq called me up and said, you just leveled my city. And he said, and I said to him, OK, what are you going to do about it? And that's from the City Morning Herald on the 8th. They managed to get that audio incredibly enough.

But he just shoots his mouth off, which is enormously fun, Pratt. And so this has caused proper headlines in the US. Oh, absolutely. Yeah, right. Why not just add to Donald Trump's appeal for Americans, especially the one about him murdering. innocent Iranians or Iraqis or whatever was. The militants, yeah.

The militants. Like, that'll totally go over well. It'll be like, oh, that's very presidential. It is possible. But Pratt basically just boasted about how it's very easy to get Trump on board. You just join Mar-a-Lago. You just join. Yeah.

And just try. And so consequently, he just bought access to the president when he was the president. The US media can't be shocked. Shock. You can buy access to politicians in the US. Like, isn't it just the... Well, doesn't it normally work that you actually give the money? directly and go and hang out at their club

and they reveal national security secrets to you. So Trump denies all of this. Maybe the Russians should just do that. They probably have. They probably have. Probably have. But I do like some of the stuff Pratt says. So he just says, you know, he's outrageous. He just says whatever the fuck he wants.

He'll have to shock people. He clearly doesn't like Trump very much. He just sees him as a client that he can buy. Yes. Like, he's the president who he can buy. So basically, Trump has come back and slammed Pratt, as always, denied that he ever talked to him about the submarines. This is the other thing.

He apparently tipped him off about Orcus. Oh, wow. Which is another nice little detail there. They're now obviously not such friends anymore. I love this quote from Pratt. Can you imagine how yuck it would be to poke someone's eyes out in a fight? So Trump does that, but in life, he's shameless and fearless. He's got incredible balls.

There's one person who likes the idea of Donald Trump's genitalia. So, yeah, so there's a little bit of alienation there. But that's not where his influence ends, Charles. There's an Australian link too. Oh, okay. And I'll mention that after this. Thank you for your patience. Your call is important.

Can't take being on hold anymore? FIS is 100% online, so you can make the switch in minutes. Mobile plans start at $15 a month. Certain conditions apply. Details at fizz.ca. The Chaser Report. Less news more often. So guess which two prime ministers had a monthly retainer from Anthony Pratt

that we know about? No, it'll be, I bet you a million dollars. which Anthony can pay for it'll be embarrassingly it will be I'm guessing Bob Hawke and Paul Keating Paul Keating is one of them Paul Keating was getting apparently $25,000 a month I know isn't that extraordinary it's just really disappointing when I know the guy's got an expensive antique clock habit but wouldn't you expect Keating to be a little bit more discerning or maybe if you're going to sell yourself sell yourself for a lot of money yeah what did he have to do for the 25th well he's denied giving any advice to do with the US

doesn't want to get caught up in the Trump stuff. He says he sort of provided him with strategic global advice about how to escalate his business around, which I should look up the exact quote, but it's just boring. He says... The first time Paul Keating has ever been boring in his life. So Paul Keating says, I don't advise him on commercial or government matters. My advice is limited to big picture issues of the international kind. Ah, that's what I'm going to look.

From now on, if anyone wants big picture issue conversation, that's me, 25,000 bucks a month. Yep, that's what it's worth. Which is the exact thing, ironically, that he'd log. office for, do you remember? Yeah. People were sick of him talking about in national big pictures. Yeah. Aficulize and age.

Who's the other one? It'll be... Now, the other one's only worth eight grand a month. Okay, so it'll be Tony Abbott. It is Tony Abbott. He's only worth eight grand a month. He's not even worth eight grand a month, really. I mean...

But I kind of like how shamelessly transactional Pratt is. Because, like, he sponsored Sherry Markson's show for the whole of the Morrison government. Oh, yeah. And then the moment that Morrison was voted out, he just cancelled his sponsorship. Apparently, he made a million dollar donation. to the Yes campaign, Pratt, after talking to an Albanese staffer. So he's just basically buying influence wherever it is. And that's kind of the shocking thing about all this.

It's just how unashamed he is about what he does. Which brings us to potentially the biggest scandal of all. Yeah, look, I want to hear this, because this will be about King Charles, won't it? I must say, of all the people who I would expect would not want to take money from a billionaire, King Charles is the one. And yet apparently... But also, why does he need... Like, isn't it one air to another air?

Are they both sort of billionaire airs? This is one of the really funny things about the revelation. So apparently Pratt paid Prince Charles $182,000 in 2021. That's when he said, my superpower is that I'm rich. Let's listen to the audio here. My superpower is that I'm rich. So I'm useful to him, right? I see him as an undervalue political stock because he's about to be king.

It's just that everyone's a laughing stock now. But when he's king, they won't be laughing. And so he said, so I'm useful to Charles because I'm rich. Why does Charles need any money? I don't know. His job is to inherit money, like literally. Well, maybe he didn't have much back then. Maybe Mummy was keeping the purse strings tight.

But he owns half of Essex. He does now, but he didn't back in 2021. And here's the funny thing about it. The really patronising thing that Pratt said was, well, I see him as an undervalued political stock. It's just that he's a laughing stock now, but when he's king, they won't be laughing, which, you know, correct. So he saw it as like, back the air now. And he knows all about being the shitty air with the terrible hair. And it was very shrewd of him.

to guess that Queen Elizabeth the second would die. Well, she was only 94 back then, I think. Yeah, that's right. Very shrewd. But it astonishes me that Pratt gave money apparently to King Charles himself. Like, I just find that absolutely baffling. Why would you allow that to happen? I just don't understand it at all.

I mean, I can understand accepting $182,000. But mind you, I'm not King Charles. This is the thing that I don't understand is what did Prince Charles think was going on? What was going through his mind? Or do people just come up to him all the time and give him money? And also, why? Like, isn't the whole point that he's supposed to have no power? It's a bit baffling, isn't it?

Yes, of course. He's a neutral constitutional figure with no agenda ever, naturally. So in 2022, an assistant to the king came to him and said, look, Anthony, just only give the money to our charities. Don't get the money to us anymore. It's not right. And so, Pratt's comment was, they're just so close to becoming the king that he doesn't want me to bring down the monarchy.

Oh, wow. Because Pratt was aware that if this came out, this might be a problem. It was Dodge First. And he went on to say, he was. He just doesn't want the appearance for anything. It's legal, but he doesn't want it to look, and then in inverted commas, like, anything improper. So he was aware that it could look terrible. This is mind-blowing.

Like, why do they need any more? I just, I sort of understand giving money to Trump, because Trump's this sort of greedy, ever-ishishist guy who's got to be on the mate the whole time. Yeah, Charles is about to inherit ten palaces. Yeah, and he sort of already runs England. What is... Isn't it baffling? It's so weird.

And then... But there's also, when Pat refers to this, too, there was a controversy at one. one point. I mean, it feels sinister, where money was given to the Prince's foundation, like to the charity by a Saudi tycoon, who got given then a knighthood in response. And Pratt goes, oh, I don't really want

a knighthood, because like everyone's got one. So what is he? He wants to be the Duke of something, doesn't he? He just wants power and influence. So it's extraordinary. I mean, I also think that a king would have cost less than $180,000, wouldn't you? So Pratt has also, since 2013, been the chair of the Prince's

trust in Australia, and he's given millions of dollars for the organisation. So he's given a lot of money to the charity here in Australia, which does good things. The Prince's Trust is fine, but it's another example of how you buy influence.

Well, I once had it explained to me that if you ever want to get on to the board, you know, of these big arts councils and things like that, like there's, you know, or the Opera House Trust or whatever, that essentially it's just a complete pay-to-play system.

Yeah. And the whole thing is structured around how much money you're prepared to put on the table, how much money can you raise on behalf of whatever arts organization or whatever thing. And so the reason why, especially in the US, people need, you know, people will go through divorces and they'll only get $30 billion.

Like I think one of the complaints that one eris made was. Don't you hate it when you only get the $30 billion? Yeah, they only got $30 billion. It's an insult. And that actually, that then takes you out of contention for various boards. Serious boards. Yeah, if you and your husband are worth $60 billion and then in the divorce settlement, you're only going to get five billion dollars.

And suddenly, there's a whole lot of boards that will go, you're only five million. Get off the board. We only accept people who are worth 20 billion or more or whatever. It's so embarrassing, isn't it? I should clarify, Anthony Pratt is no longer on the board of the Prince's trust. Julie Bishop's the chair of the board. Yes. But he was part of it for a very long time.

But if you're moving through life as a billionaire, Charles, it must be so weird. Because every single person you hang out with, you've bought. You've paid money to. I know. Maybe this is just normal to them. It's actually very sad, isn't it? Well, I suspect on balance, it's pretty great. He's pretty happy.

But, yeah, you would not know who your best friends are because he probably thought that Prince Charles was his best friend and, you know, giving $180,000 is like nothing if you've got a billion. So he said at one point he likes having a cup of tea with the king every year and he has for a long time. And maybe they just sit there and talk about being a disappointment to their parents. Yes, exactly. And if I said to you, Dom, if I was a billionaire and I gave you, no, say I

It wasn't a bit. It's how it was me. I love how hard it is for you to understand this system. It speaks to both your integrity and your total brokenness. You just don't understand this at all. I think it's like if I paid you $18 a year to hang out with me. Yeah. Yeah.

Proportionally speaking, I'd have a cup of tea with you for $18. Would you? Just the one. Oh, that's nice. Yeah, thank you. Is that the only reason you're doing it, though? Well, you'd never know. I imagine when you're Anthony Pratt, it's best not to ask.

Because you don't want to know the answer. So that's how the world works, Charles. Basically, even the king himself has accepted money from this guy. You know, I thought that this was going to be one of these stories where it's like, oh, this is so funny and it's so awkward and embarrassing and aren't they all shitheads? And I've just ended this podcast going, this is really sad. And I kind of feel totally sorry for him. And I know I'm not supposed to because he's a billionaire and everything.

I know what you mean. So Anthony Pratt, can we make an offer to you here and now? and we should probably do it in writing, because he's having a rough time right now. And we know what it's like, Charles, better than almost anybody to get unfavourable headlines. Yes. Anthony Pratt, if you want a cup of tea with us,

let's offer right now. We won't make any comments about your hair. And frankly, Charles has got pretty awful orange hair as well. I don't have any. So you're doing better than me, Anthony. Yes. You can come and have a cup of tea with us any time you like, and it will only cost you $182,000.

And actually, I've got some really good anecdotes about cardboard boxes, so I think he'll get along really well. Well, this is the funniest thing about the whole story for me. And as Mark DeStefano, the journalist, pointed out on Twitter, Donald Trump is on criminal trial in the United States for an offence involving cardboard boxes. Wouldn't it be fantastic if they were made by Vizzi? They were Vizzi.

This is the documents he stored in the bathroom at Murrow-Lago. So he's right there. Can you imagine Anthony Pratt walking to the bathroom going, Mr. President, these aren't my cardboard boxes? Can I give you some busy sample stock? So there you go. That's how the world works. I suppose this is one of these things where, I mean, I said at the start of the podcast,

this might bring down Donald Trump or the king. But in the end, it'll disappear in 24 hours. Everyone will go, yeah, of course, that's the way the world works. We'll feel a little sadder about that and then just go about our miserable non-billionaire lives. It's like the Penabar papers, but this one's the Prattie card boardies. Sure. Cardboards. The Pratt files.

I really think the Pratt files just sums it up. Look, at least his name is not Dick Pratt. And that's the one thing. He may be less successful than his father. I'm not sure. He seems to be doing all right in the business. But at least he's not called Dick Pratt. Our Gears from Road, we are part of the Oconiclass Network.

Get you tomorrow. And if you want to buy influence from us, podcast at chaser.com. We're always available and you would probably not be surprised by just how cheap we are. Thank you for your patience. Your call is important. Can't take being on hold anymore. Fizz is 100% online so you can make the switch in minutes. Mobile plans

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