Some Australian fans who paid for tickets to Donald Trump Jr’s Australian tour in 2023 are still waiting for refunds, with one fan saying the organiser has failed to respond to emails for close to a month.
The eldest son of the former US president and Republican frontrunner for the 2024 US presidential election was due to speak at events in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne in July last year but the event was postponed to September amid claims of difficulty securing a visa.
Organisers said in September that the event had been postponed because of a “scheduling conflict” with Trump Jr to December. In early December, ticket holders received another email stating the event would be moved to 2024.
Brian, a fan who bought two general admission tickets for the Queensland show for $190, said the company had not responded since the end of January.
“Now it’s just incommunicado … there’s nothing,” he said.
Brian said he has sent multiple email refund requests but they have gone unanswered. In the last communication on 30 January from the organisation, seen by Guardian Australia, the organisation said: “We’ll be in touch when your refund has been processed.”
Since then, Brian has attempted to contact the organisers, as well as the ticket sellers, and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), but has had no luck in getting a refund.
Customers had also tried to contact the organisers on their social media accounts.
“My cancelled Donald Trump jr ticket from May still hasn’t been refunded. It’s been 8 months now and I’ve sent multiple emails to them,” another customer on Facebook posted on Turning Point Australia’s Facebook page in January.
One signatory to a Change.org petition earlier this month claimed they had been attempting to get a refund for months but had no luck.
Turning Point Australia has not been posting on its social media accounts since November last year. Its founder, the rightwing influencer Joel Jammal, has not posted on Facebook, Instagram, Telegram, YouTube, X/Twitter or TikTok since November.
The Turning Point Australia website also no longer has a contact form. The site announcing the Trump Jr tour now says it is a “Gavin McInnes and Tommy Robinson” tour site that is currently being updated.
Jammal told Guardian Australia via email he is in the process of working through Trump jr’s availability for this year, and the logistics for venues.
“We will be making an announcement in March regarding this,” he said.
He put the responsibility for ticketing on the ticketing companies, saying all money was held by those organisations.
“We have had several complaints from ticketholders that ticketing agencies are being slow in refunding tickets, and we are doing our best to investigate each case,” he said. “We have given each request an undertaking that their case will be dealt with and are holding the ticketing agencies to account on each case. We have successfully resolved and refunded over 2,000 individual cases to date.”
Ticketek was responsible for sales for the Sydney show, while a US-based company, Ticketbud, managed the other two shows. It is understood that Ticketek has either processed refunds or is in communication with those customers who had bought tickets to the Sydney show.
The Ticketek event is no longer listed, while the Melbourne Ticketbud event is still online, but listed for the December 2023 date.
Ticketbud did not respond to a request for comment.
Brian said he did not blame Trump Jr for the difficulty in obtaining a refund. Guardian Australia has been unable to contact Trump Jr.
