{"id":17475,"date":"2025-12-17T06:51:58","date_gmt":"2025-12-17T14:51:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/?p=17475"},"modified":"2026-01-07T07:02:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T15:02:07","slug":"susie-wiles-jd-vance-and-the-junkyard-dogs-the-white-house-chief-of-staff-on-trumps-second-term-vanity-fair","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/?p=17475","title":{"rendered":"“Susie Wiles, JD Vance, and the \u201cJunkyard Dogs\u201d: The White House Chief of Staff on Trump\u2019s Second Term”, Vanity Fair"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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PHOTOGRAPHER CHRISTOPHER ANDERSON.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

EYE OF THE HURRICANE<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Part 1 of 2)<\/h1>\n\n\n\n
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Throughout the first year of Donald Trump\u2019s second administration, Vanity Fair<\/em> writer Chris Whipple has interviewed Wiles amid each moment of crisis. This insider\u2019s account joins a portfolio of portraits for an unflinching, up-close look at power\u2014and peril.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

BY CHRIS WHIPPLE<\/a> PHOTOGRAPHER CHRISTOPHER ANDERSON<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

DECEMBER 16, 2025<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the morning of November 4, 2025, an off-year Election Day, White House chief of staff Susie Wiles<\/a>was meeting in the Oval Office with the president and his top advisers, men she calls her \u201ccore team\u201d: Vice President JD Vance<\/a>, Secretary of State Marco Rubio<\/a>, and Stephen Miller<\/a>, deputy chief of staff. The agenda was twofold: ending the congressional filibuster and forcing Venezuelan president Nicol\u00e1s Maduro from power. As she related it later, President Donald Trump was holding forth on the filibuster when Wiles stood up and started for the door. Trump eyed her. \u201cIs this an emergency, that you have to leave?\u201d he demanded. It was nothing of the sort\u2014but Wiles left Trump guessing. She replied: \u201cIt\u2019s an emergency. It doesn\u2019t involve you.\u201d With that, according to Wiles, she departed the Oval.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Click here<\/a> to read Part 2 of 2 from Vanity Fair<\/em>\u2019s portfolio of Trump\u2019s inner circle.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wiles, wearing dark pants and a plain black leather top, met me in her office with a smile and a handshake. Over sandwiches from the White House Mess, we talked about the challenges Trump faces. Throughout the past year, Wiles and I have spoken regularly about almost everything: the contents, and consequences, of the Epstein files<\/a>; ICE\u2019s brutal mass deportations<\/a>; Elon Musk\u2019s evisceration<\/a> of USAID; the controversial deployment of the National Guard<\/a> to US cities; the demolition<\/a> of the East Wing; the lethal strikes on boats allegedly being piloted by drug smugglers\u2014acts many have called war crimes; Trump\u2019s physical and mental health<\/a>; and whether he will defy the 22nd Amendment<\/a> and try to stay on for a third term.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m not an enabler. I\u2019m also not a bitch,\u201d said Susie Wiles. \u201cI guess time will tell whether I\u2019ve been effective.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Most senior White House officials parse their words and speak only on background. But over many on-the-record conversations, Wiles answered almost every question I put to her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We often spoke on Sundays after church. Wiles, an Episcopalian, calls herself \u201cCatholic lite.\u201d One time we spoke while she was doing her laundry in her Washington, DC, rental. Trump, she told me, \u201chas an alcoholic\u2019s personality.\u201d Vance\u2019s conversion from Never Trumper to MAGA acolyte, she said, has been \u201csort of political.\u201d The vice president, she added, has been \u201ca conspiracy theorist for a decade.\u201d Russell Vought, architect of the notorious Project 2025 and head of the Office of Management and Budget, is \u201ca right-wing absolute zealot.\u201d When I asked her what she thought of Musk reposting a tweet about public sector workers killing millions under Hitler, Stalin, and Mao, she replied: \u201cI think that\u2019s when he\u2019s microdosing.\u201d (She says she doesn’t have first-hand knowledge.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wiles is the most powerful person in Trump\u2019s White House other than the president himself; unlike any chief of staff before her, she is a woman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cSo many decisions of great consequence are being made on the whim of the president. And as far as I can tell, the only force that can direct or channel that whim is Susie,\u201d a former Republican chief told me. \u201cIn most White Houses, the chief of staff is first among a bunch of equals. She may be first with no equals.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think there\u2019s anybody in the world right now that could do the job that she\u2019s doing,\u201d Rubio told me. He called her bond with Trump \u201can earned trust.\u201d Vance described Wiles\u2019s approach to the chief\u2019s job. \u201cThere is this idea that people have that I think was very common in the first administration,\u201d he told me, \u201cthat their objective was to control the president or influence the president, or even manipulate the president because they had to in order to serve the national interest. Susie just takes the diametrically opposite viewpoint, which is that she\u2019s a facilitator, that the American people have elected Donald Trump. And her job is to actually facilitate his vision and to make his vision come to life.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s been a busy year. Trump and his team have expanded the limits of presidential power, unilaterally declared war on drug cartels, imposed tariffs<\/a> according to whim, sealed the southern border<\/a>, achieved a ceasefire and hostage release in Gaza<\/a>, and pressured NATO allies<\/a> into increasing their defense spending.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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At the same time, Trump has waged war on his political enemies; pardoned the January 6<\/a> rioters, firing nearly everyone involved in their investigation and prosecution; sued media companies into multimillion-dollar settlements; indicted multiple government officials he perceives as his foes; and pressured universities to toe his line. He\u2019s redefined the way presidents behave\u2014verbally abusing women, minorities, and almost anyone who offends him. Charlie Kirk<\/a>\u2019s assassination in September turbocharged Trump\u2019s campaign of revenge and retribution. Critics have compared this moment to a Reichstag fire, a modern version of Hitler\u2019s exploitation of the torching of Berlin\u2019s parliament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Historically, the White House chief of staff is the president\u2019s gatekeeper, confidant, and executor of his agenda. That often means telling the president hard truths. Upon taking office, Ronald Reagan was hell-bent on reforming Social Security. James A. Baker III explained to him that cutting Social Security benefits was the third rail of American politics. Reagan pivoted to tax cuts\u2014and was ultimately reelected in a landslide. Donald Rumsfeld, Gerald Ford\u2019s chief, explained: \u201cThe White House chief of staff is the one person besides his wife\u2026who can look him right in the eye and say, \u2018This is not right. You simply can\u2019t go down that road.\u2019\u2009\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just how far will Trump veer off the guardrails of democracy?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The question around Wiles\u2019s tenure under Trump has been whether she will do anything to restrain him. A better question: Does she want<\/em> to?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

T-MINUS 9 DAYS<\/strong>
January 11, 2025<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Our first conversation took place little more than a week before the inauguration. Wiles called from the road, en route from Mar-a-Lago<\/a> to her home in Ponte Vedra, Florida, in her BMW 530. She was in high spirits, basking in Trump\u2019s victory. Not that she\u2019d ever doubted the outcome. \u201cAt no point did I think we would not win,\u201d she said. \u201cNot in my core, not in my sleep, not in my rational mind.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Wiles\u2019s view, RFK Jr.\u2019s shock treatment of HHS is warranted. \u201cHe pushes the envelope\u2014some would say too far. But I say in order to get back to the middle, you have to push it too far.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But on that January day, as his second inauguration approached, Wiles was determined to show the world a new Trump. \u201cI told Hakeem Jeffries<\/a>, \u2018You will see a different Donald Trump when he gets there,\u2019\u2009\u2019\u2019 she recounted to me. \u201cI\u2019ve not seen him throw anything, I\u2019ve not seen him scream. I didn\u2019t see that really horrible behavior that people talk about and that I actually experienced years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wiles\u2019s childhood had prepared her for difficult men. She was raised in Stamford, Connecticut, and Saddle River, New Jersey, the only daughter and eldest of three siblings. It was her famous father, Pat Summerall, who put Wiles on a path to the pinnacle of political power. Summerall had been a kicker for the New York Giants and afterward parlayed his knowledge and mellifluous baritone into fame and fortune as the \u201cvoice of the NFL.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At her father\u2019s knee, Susie Summerall became a football aficionado, rattling off win-loss records and player stats like a miniature John Madden\u2014an ability she says Trump shares. \u201cThe president, it turns out, is a junkie of that and is like a statistical savant,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd I remember a lot of it.\u201d As a child, Susie also absorbed the zeitgeist of her father\u2019s 1970s Manhattan. \u201cMuch of what Donald Trump remembers about the New York of the \u201970s I lived through with my dad,\u201d she said. \u201cSo when he talks about Frank Sinatra\u2019s bodyguard, I know that name.\u201d Steve Witkoff, Trump\u2019s real estate friend turned special envoy, says Wiles and Trump are creatures of that same bygone era: \u201cThat whole world of the Copacabana and Sammy Davis Jr. and all, those are things that he wants to talk about.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The most valuable gift Susie got from her dad was hard-earned. Summerall was an absentee father and an alcoholic, and Wiles helped her mother stage interventions to get him into treatment. (Summerall was sober for 21 years before his death in 2013.) \u201cAlcoholism does bad things to relationships, and so it was with my dad and me,\u201d Wiles said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSome clinical psychologist that knows one million times more than I do will dispute what I\u2019m going to say. But high-functioning alcoholics or alcoholics in general, their personalities are exaggerated when they drink. And so I\u2019m a little bit of an expert in big personalities.\u201d Wiles said Trump has \u201can alcoholic\u2019s personality.\u201d He \u201coperates [with] a view that there\u2019s nothing he can\u2019t do. Nothing, zero, nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Susie Summerall got her first taste of politics in the late 1970s, interning as a college student in the Capitol Hill office of Jack Kemp, the New York congressman, who\u2019d been a Giant with her father. Then, at 23, she landed a job in the Reagan White House as a scheduler, where she watched his chief of staff Baker in action. She married a GOP advance man, Lanny Wiles, and in 1984 they moved to Ponte Vedra. Wiles wanted to \u201cstart a family and a life outside politics.\u201d But in 1988, Baker lured Wiles back to work with Dan Quayle, George H.W. Bush\u2019s running mate. The couple had two daughters, Katie and Caroline. Wiles plunged into state politics\u2014and over the next two decades became a formidable political strategist, serving as chief of staff to the mayor of Jacksonville, Florida, running Rick Scott\u2019s gubernatorial campaign, and, briefly, leading Jon Huntsman\u2019s campaign for president.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2015, Wiles was invited to Trump Tower to meet the real estate tycoon turned presidential candidate. The star of The Apprentice<\/em><\/a> couldn\u2019t believe he was talking to the daughter of the great Pat Summerall. \u201cHe\u2019s said it a million times,\u201d Wiles said. \u201c\u2009\u2018I judge people by their genes.\u2019\u2009\u201d Wiles thought Trump was interesting and smart. \u201cAnd they called me one night and said, \u2018We\u2019re serious about Florida now. Would you like to co-chair our leadership team?\u2019 And I said, \u2018Yeah, I would.\u2019\u2009\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI had become disenchanted with what we now call traditional Republicans,\u201d she recalled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wiles\u2019s relationship with Trump almost ended at his Miami golf club one night in the fall of 2016. Unhappy with a poll showing him doing worse than expected in Florida, Trump berated her in front of a gaggle of cronies. \u201cIt was a horrific hour-plus at midnight,\u201d Wiles told me. \u201cAnd I don\u2019t think I\u2019ve seen him that angry since. He was ranting and raving. And I didn\u2019t know whether to argue back or whether to be stoic. What I really wanted to do was cry.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Wiles steeled herself. \u201cI finally said, \u2018You know Mr. Trump, if you want somebody to set their hair on fire and be crazy, I\u2019m not your girl. But if you want to win this state, I am. It\u2019s your choice.\u2019\u2009\u201d Wiles walked out. Trump turned on a dime. \u201cLo and behold, he called me every day.\u201d Wiles never looked back. Trump carried Florida, the first big prize in his stunning 2016 upset over Hillary Clinton.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then, in a fateful turn of events, Wiles went to work in 2018 for an ambitious gubernatorial candidate named Ron DeSantis<\/a>. (Trump urged DeSantis, then his prot\u00e9g\u00e9, to hire her.) She led the underdog candidate to victory. But afterward, DeSantis turned on her, denouncing Wiles publicly and bad-mouthing her privately. To this day, Wiles doesn\u2019t know what triggered the governor\u2019s vendetta. \u201cI think he thought I was getting too much attention, which is ironic,\u201d she told me. \u201cI don\u2019t ever seek attention.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

George W. Bush himself had gotten wind of the gutting of PEPFAR. He called Rubio to express alarm, according to a former aide close to Bush. \u201cHe\u2019s been appalled by Trump from the beginning.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wiles landed on her feet, organizing Florida for Trump\u2019s 2020 reelection bid. Trump had rescued Wiles, recently divorced, at a dark moment in her life. (Wiles and her husband divorced in 2017\u2014due, she has said, to his bad financial decisions.) Looking back on DeSantis\u2019s behavior, Wiles reflected: \u201cHad he said, \u2018Look, thank you. I appreciate your help. We\u2019re done here.\u2019 I believe the course of his history would have been different. I might or might not have gone to work for Donald Trump.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DAY 1<\/strong>
January 20, 2025<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

On Trump\u2019s first day in office<\/a>, the president signed a flurry of executive orders, 26 in all, withdrawing the US from the World Health Organization and the Paris climate agreement, rescinding birthright citizenship, sending troops to the southern border, freezing foreign aid, and stopping federal hiring. Then Trump issued pardons to almost everyone convicted in the bloody January 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol, in which nine people ultimately died and 150 were injured. Even rioters who\u2019d beaten cops within an inch of their lives were set free. (Fourteen people convicted of seditious conspiracy had their sentences commuted.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A picture of old friends in better times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A statuette of President Donald Trump sits at the copier in Susie Wiles\u2019s support-staff office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Robert F. Kennedy Jr. departs the White House on November 13.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Challenge coins, which are on various displays throughout the White House.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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James Blair apparently wears many hats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Photographer Christopher Anderson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The staff entrance to the West Wing, away from the prying eyes of the press.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Did she ever ask the president, \u201c\u2009\u2018Wait a minute, do you really want to pardon all 1,500 January 6 convicts, or should we be more selective?\u2019\u2009\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI did exactly that,\u201d Wiles replied. \u201cI said, \u2018I am on board with the people that were happenstancers or didn\u2019t do anything violent. And we certainly know what everybody did because the FBI has done such an incredible job.\u2019\u2009\u201d (Trump has said his FBI investigators were \u201ccorrupt\u201d and part of a \u201cdeep state.\u201d) But Trump argued that even the violent offenders had been unfairly treated. Wiles explained: \u201cIn every case, of the ones he was looking at, in every case, they had already served more time than the sentencing guidelines would have suggested. So given that, I sort of got on board.\u201d (According to court records, many of the January 6 rioters pardoned by Trump had received sentences that were lighter than the guidelines.) \u201cThere have been a couple of times where I\u2019ve been outvoted,\u201d Wiles said. \u201cAnd if there\u2019s a tie, he wins.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the West Wing, Wiles is surrounded by young MAGA men. \u201cShe is a \u2018go to church every Sunday, uses a swear word very, very rarely\u2019\u2009\u201d person, said James Blair<\/a>, Wiles\u2019s 36-year-old deputy chief of staff. \u201cShe doesn\u2019t raise her voice. But she likes being around junkyard dogs.\u201d Indeed, Wiles has seemed content to let her pit bulls\u2014deputy chiefs of staff Miller, Blair, and Dan Scavino\u2014run loose as she watches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During Oval Office events, Wiles almost always sits just off camera. \u201cThere\u2019s the president and then there\u2019s whoever the three high-ranking people are on the sofa,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd then there\u2019s a chair at the corner of the sofa, which is my chair, which means I\u2019m the one that gets hit in the head with the boom mic.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For all the chaos in the Cabinet, Wiles has kept palace intrigue and shivving to a minimum in the White House. Trump has empowered her; when Wiles weighs in, everyone knows she is speaking for him. She has in turn empowered her team: Blair, Miller, Scavino, and Taylor Budowich, who departed in September.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cFirst and foremost, she brings no ego,\u201d says Blair. \u201cAnd that is the starting point from which just an immense amount of power flows. There\u2019s so much ego and testosterone around her, there wouldn\u2019t be any room for hers anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From day one, Wiles had to grapple with another power center: Elon Musk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHe is a complete solo actor,\u201d said Wiles of Trump\u2019s billionaire pal who led the scorched-earth blitz known as the Department of Government Efficiency. Wiles described Musk<\/a> as something akin to a jacked-up Nosferatu. \u201cThe challenge with Elon is keeping up with him,\u201d she told me. \u201cHe\u2019s an avowed ketamine [user]. And he sleeps in a sleeping bag in the EOB [Executive Office Building] in the daytime. And he\u2019s an odd, odd duck, as I think geniuses are. You know, it\u2019s not helpful, but he is his own person.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Musk triggered the first true crisis of the Trump presidency and an early test for Wiles. Trump\u2019s chief was shocked when the SpaceX founder eviscerated USAID, the United States Agency for International Development. \u201cI was initially aghast,\u201d Wiles told me. \u201cBecause I think anybody that pays attention to government and has ever paid attention to USAID believed, as I did, that they do very good work.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In his executive order freezing foreign aid, Trump had decreed that lifesaving programs should be spared. Instead, they were shuttered. \u201cWhen Elon said, \u2018We\u2019re doing this,\u2019 he was already into it,\u201d said Wiles. \u201cAnd that\u2019s probably because he knew it would be horrifying to others. But he decided that it was a better approach to shut it down, fire everybody, shut them out, and then go rebuild. Not the way I would do it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wiles knew that fixing this was on her. \u201cThe president doesn\u2019t know and never will,\u201d she told me. \u201cHe doesn\u2019t know the details of these smallish agencies.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wiles says she called Musk on the carpet. \u201cYou can\u2019t just lock people out of their offices,\u201d she recalls telling him. At first, Wiles didn\u2019t grasp the effect that slashing USAID programs would have on humanitarian aid. \u201cI didn\u2019t know a lot about the extent of their grant making.\u201d But with immunizations halted in Africa, lives would be lost. Soon she was getting frantic calls from relief agency heads and former government officials with a dire message: Thousands of lives were in the balance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cShe is a \u2018go to church every Sunday, uses a swear word very, very rarely\u2019\u2009\u201d person, Blair, Wiles\u2019s 36-year-old deputy chief of staff said. \u201cShe doesn\u2019t raise her voice. But she likes being around junkyard dogs.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wiles continued: \u201cSo Marco is on his way to Panama. We call him and say, \u2018You\u2019re Senate-confirmed. You\u2019re going to have to be the custodian, essentially, of [USAID].\u2019 \u2018Okay,\u2019 he says.\u201d But Musk forged ahead\u2014all throttle, no brake. \u201cElon\u2019s attitude is you have to get it done fast. If you\u2019re an incrementalist, you just won\u2019t get your rocket to the moon,\u201d Wiles said. \u201cAnd so with that attitude, you\u2019re going to break some china. But no rational person could think the USAID process was a good one. Nobody.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The shuttering of USAID crippled the President\u2019s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief<\/a> (PEPFAR). The antiretroviral program, launched with $15 billion by George W. Bush in 2003, was credited with preventing millions of deaths. It depended on USAID grants. In an interview with The Financial Times,<\/em> Bill Gates remarked: \u201cThe picture of the world\u2019s richest man killing the world\u2019s poorest children is not a pretty one.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Privately, another drama was playing out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bush himself had gotten wind of the gutting of PEPFAR. He called Rubio to express alarm, according to a former aide close to Bush. \u201cHe\u2019s been appalled by Trump from the beginning and he\u2019s determined not to weigh in,\u201d the aide said. But Musk\u2019s attack on one of his legacy achievements was too much. Bush, said that person, \u201ccares deeply about the PEPFAR program. That and Wounded Warriors are the two things where he will weigh in, not publicly, but with intention.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Did Rubio<\/a> have any regrets about the untold number of lives that PEPFAR\u2019s evisceration might cost? \u201cNo. First of all, whoever says that, it\u2019s just not being accurate,\u201d he told me. \u201cWe are not eviscerating PEPFAR. PEPFAR has been rearranged and reorganized in such a way where we\u2019re now going to be able to deliver aid in a way that has a goal. The goal is to help countries become self-sustaining.\u201d With a note of \u201cAmerica First,\u201d he added: \u201cLet\u2019s begin with the premise: Is it the United States\u2019 fault? Why isn\u2019t China paying for more immunizations? Why isn\u2019t the UK or Canada or any of the G7 countries?\u201d (The UK, following in the footsteps of the US, slashed foreign aid in 2025. In November, China, which funded the Africa CDC, pledged $3.5 million in AIDS prevention in South Africa alone.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I repeated Rubio\u2019s comment to a former GOP White House chief of staff, he remarked: \u201cI find that immoral.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DAY 8<\/strong>
January 27, 2025<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur job is lethality and readiness and war fighting.\u201d \u2014Pete Hegseth on his first day at the Pentagon, days after Vance cast the tiebreaking vote in his Senate confirmation<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

For Trump, Wiles has helped pick a Cabinet of MAGA hard-liners: Pete Hegseth<\/a>, secretary of war (formerly defense); Kash Patel<\/a>, FBI director; John Ratcliffe<\/a>, CIA director; Pam Bondi<\/a>, attorney general; Tulsi Gabbard<\/a>, director of national intelligence; and Kristi Noem<\/a>, head of Homeland Security. Wiles calls them \u201ca world-class Cabinet, better than anything I could have conceived of.\u201d Trump\u2019s Cabinet members are either one of the least qualified presidential teams in history or, to hear Wiles tell it, disrupters\u2014the only people with the balls to take on an entrenched deep state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was a horrific hour-plus at midnight,\u201d Wiles said of an interaction with Trump in 2016. \u201cAnd I don\u2019t think I\u2019ve seen him that angry since. He was ranting and raving. And I didn\u2019t know whether to argue back or whether to be stoic. What I really wanted to do was cry.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cPeople talk about the deep state being at the State Department,\u201d Wiles said. \u201cIt\u2019s not. It\u2019s the military-industrial complex.\u201d Hegseth, in her view, is just the guy to take on the powers that be. She referred to Health and Human Services secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.<\/a>, another world-class disrupter, as \u201cmy Bobby\u201d and \u201cquirky Bobby.\u201d In Wiles\u2019s view, RFK Jr.\u2019s shock treatment of HHS is warranted. \u201cHe pushes the envelope\u2014some would say too far. But I say in order to get back to the middle, you have to push it too far.\u201d (In December, Kennedy\u2019s federal vaccine panel voted to end the decades-long recommendation for newborn vaccinations against hepatitis B, which is highly infectious and causes liver failure.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DAY 56<\/strong>
March 16, 2025<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

\u201cUS deports hundreds of Venezuelans to El Salvador, despite court order.\u201d \u2014NPR<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In mid-March, after Trump invoked the Alien Enemies Act, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents (ICE) shackled and herded 238 immigrants onto transport planes and flew them to a notoriously brutal Salvadoran prison. According to Trump, the men were members of Tren de Aragua, a violent Venezuelan gang, but the evidence was sketchy (often based on tattoos alone). Most had committed no serious crimes; one, Kilmar Abrego Garcia<\/a>, was deported by mistake, the Trump administration admitted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cI will concede that we\u2019ve got to look harder at our process for deportation,\u201d Wiles told me at the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When we spoke again in April, in cities across the country, masked ICE agents were snatching people off the street, throwing them in vans, and zip-tying and frog-marching them into makeshift deportation camps. Many were US citizens or entitled to be here. (ProPublica documented 170 cases in the first nine months of 2025 of US citizens being caught up in ICE\u2019s dragnet.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m a little bit of an expert in big personalities.\u201d Wiles said Trump has \u201can alcoholic\u2019s personality.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf somebody is a known gang member who has a criminal past, and you\u2019re sure, and you can demonstrate it, it\u2019s probably fine to send them to El Salvador or whatever,\u201d Wiles told me. \u201cBut if there is a question, I think our process has to lean toward a double-check.\u201d But as the usa.gov site itself notes, \u201cIn some cases, a noncitizen is subject to expedited removal without being able to attend a hearing in immigration court.\u201d Not long after the El Salvador deportation fiasco, in Louisiana, ICE agents arrested and deported two mothers, along with their children, ages seven, four, and two, to Honduras. The children were US citizens and the four-year-old was being treated for stage 4 cancer. Wiles couldn\u2019t explain it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt could be an overzealous Border Patrol agent, I don\u2019t know,\u201d she said of the case, in which both mothers had reportedly been arrested after voluntarily attending routine immigration meetings. \u201cI can\u2019t understand how you make that mistake, but somebody did.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DAY 74<\/strong>
April 3, 2025<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLong-threatened tariffs from U.S. President Donald Trump have plunged the country into trade wars abroad\u2026.\u201d \u2014PBS News<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The president declared April 2 \u201cLiberation Day<\/a>,\u201d bragging about billions of dollars that would flow into US coffers from tariffs, refusing to acknowledge that the levies were a tax on consumers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The question around Wiles\u2019s tenure under Trump has been whether she will do anything to restrain him. A better question: Does she want<\/em> to?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSo much thinking out loud is what I would call it,\u201d said Wiles of Trump\u2019s chaotic tariff rollout. \u201cThere was a huge disagreement over whether [tariffs were] a good idea.\u201d Trump\u2019s advisers were sharply divided, some believing tariffs were a panacea and others predicting disaster. Wiles told them to get with Trump\u2019s program. \u201cI said, \u2018This is where we\u2019re going to end up. So figure out how you can work into what he\u2019s already thinking.\u2019 Well, they couldn\u2019t get there.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Image<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Wiles recruited Vance to help tap the brakes. \u201cWe told Donald Trump, \u2018Hey, let\u2019s not talk about tariffs today. Let\u2019s wait until we have the team in complete unity and then we\u2019ll do it,\u2019\u2009\u201d she said. But Trump barreled ahead, announcing sweeping \u201creciprocal\u201d tariffs, from 10 to 100 percent\u2014which triggered panic in the bond market and a sell-off of stocks. Trump paused his policy for 90 days, but by that time the president\u2019s helter-skelter levies had given rise to the TACO<\/a> chant: \u201cTrump Always Chickens Out.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wiles believed a middle ground on tariffs would ultimately succeed, she said, \u201cbut it\u2019s been more painful than I expected.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the time this article went to press, shortly before the December holidays, a Harvard poll showed 56 percent of voters think Trump\u2019s tariff policies have harmed the economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DAY 207<\/strong>
August 14, 2025<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNational Guard mobilizes 800 troops in DC to Support Federal, Local Law Enforcement\u2014Trump declared a crime emergency in the nation\u2019s capital.\u201d \u2014US Department of War<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the summer, Trump ordered the National Guard<\/a> into four Democratic-led cities, claiming the troops were needed to crack down on crime and protect federal immigration facilities. In June the president deployed some 4,000 guard troops to Los Angeles; later he sent them to Washington, describing the city\u2019s crime rate as \u201cout of control.\u201d \u201cThis was like a vitamin boost of ICE, of the [National] Guard, of the Park Service police, who actually have more authority than the DC Metro Police,\u201d Wiles said. \u201cAnd the idea was to right the ship and then slowly back off. And that\u2019s what we\u2019re doing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think there\u2019s anybody in the world right now that could do the job that she\u2019s doing,\u201d Rubio said of Wiles. He called her bond with Trump \u201can earned trust.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Critics denounced the deployments as unconstitutional, performative, and ineffective, and many feared Trump had another, more sinister plan up his sleeve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Will the president use the military to suppress or even prevent voting during the midterms and beyond?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI say it is categorically false, will not happen, it\u2019s just wrongheaded,\u201d she snapped.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDo you understand where people who think that are coming from?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI do a little bit, but not fully. I mean, I think they hate the president. They think he\u2019s too wrapped up in what happened in 2020.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The president and his team were pushing almost every legal and constitutional boundary and defying courts to stop them. But would Trump obey the Supreme Court? \u201cDo you think he will adhere to whatever the courts decide in the end?\u201d I asked Wiles. \u201cI do,\u201d she replied. But Wiles made a prediction: \u201cThe smart lawyers around us think that we will be slowed down, as we already have been, but we will ultimately prevail.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Click here<\/a> to read Part 2 of 2 from Vanity Fair<\/em>\u2019s portfolio of Trump\u2019s inner circle.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

More Great Stories From Vanity Fair<\/em><\/h2>\n\n\n\n