Lots of media hubbub about Susan Wiles “unvarnished” interviews published in Vanity Fair magazine.
Wiles is just too wily an operator for this to be as unvarnished as presumed. Scaramucci she isn’t. Praising the tsar and blaming the boyars is a strategy with a long history^. Wiles acknowledges some disagreements within the administration, and throws light shade at some individuals (Musk, Vance, Bondi), while generally remaining loyal to Trump’s vision, and defusing some of his controversies. What I have seen of the article seemed reasonably balanced; more so than some of the policies.
It seems unlikely Trump did not agree to this. I wouldn’t go as far as to say it is a “PR stunt”, but I doubt Trump is actually unhappy with much of what was said.
^Strictly speaking, this is the tsar taking credit for positive developments while claiming the tsar was unaware of actions taken by “boyar” secretaries and ministers. Wiles sometimes says Trump was unaware of what was going, but also often frankly says Trump persisted with his views on X despite widespread disagreement. So, in fairness, this is only the strategy some of the time.
In our apparently real timeline, Trump orders his cabinet to deliver a three-hour set of paeans to his wonderfulness while he dozes repeatedly. Karloline Leavitt is aging a month a week because her job to tell actual reporters that black is white and pigs can fly. Nowhere in this timeline lies the possibility that Trump would collude with his chief of staff to give blunt truths about his administration, even if mixed in with paeans. Nor is it conceivable that Trump freely consented to her admitting that he has an an “alcoholic’s personality.” Or that “There is no evidence” those visits [of Bill Clinton to Epstein’s island] happened. Or “He wants to keep on blowing boats up until [Nicolas] Maduro cries uncle.” Or “There was a huge disagreement over whether [tariffs were] a good idea.” Or that he should have been more selective about the Jan. 6 pardons.
The article, only half of which has been posted from what I understand, is causing shit fits throughout right-wing Washington. Rightfully so. After half of Congress slammed his Rob Reiner comments, this was the last thing Trump’s supporters would want to be forced to support.
That Trump planned this disaster is a bigger conspiracy theory than anything Vance proposed and he’s a CT nut.
Trump is not a secret genius playing 4D chess while the rest of us are too stupid to recognize his brilliance. That’s a MAGA conspiracy theory. There is going to be a lot of ketchup on the walls over this.
I do not see direct evidence concerning Trump’s smarts in the interview articles, one way or the other. But it makes Susie Wiles look both dumb and manipulated by her boss.
Dumb?
If you grant eleven long interviews to a mainstream journalist, you are going to slip up here and there, and all you will be quoted on in the article is the slipups. So the smart thing would have been to just give one short interview where you recite back your talking points.
Not in the articles is why Susie Wiles agreed to the interviews. Conceivably, Trump, who likes bad publicity and displays of power, forced her. But she still could have been more careful. The article says she was at least once interviewed, at home, doing laundry. A smart person does not try to do laundry and spin at the same time. Spinning takes complete concentration.
If I could read the full raw interviews, my opinion on this might change, but I slightly lean towards divorced Susie being in platonic love with Donald.
P.S. Some ideas here are stolen from this podcast.
They all knew this before. Wiles in particular was known for not doing on the record interviews.
I cannot find media reports saying that Donald Trump ordered Wiles to allow herself to be interviewed by Vanity Fair eleven times, in person, sometimes in her White House office, where Donald Trump reportedly walks in uninvited. But I cannot think of any other reason she would do it other than under orders from her boss. I also, with no evidence whatsoever, think that Trump ordered her to give interviewer Chris Whipple material for headlines.
Trump says that “Leakers Are Traitors and Cowards.” So if you want to leak, in his administration, you absolutely cannot do it in your first floor White House office. And if her statements weren’t leaks, they must have been on purpose. I mean, she’s not a total idiot, just partial. Right?
He treats this description as an amusing characterization of himself. I have been around alcoholics most of my life and there is nothing amusing about them. They’re often physically and mentally abusive and always manipulative. Combine those traits with Trumps sociopathy and you have a very dangerous person in charge of our nuclear arsenal.
I’m sorry but this is ridiculous. Trump is not happy with anything below abject praise, one of his toadies not calling him the best president ever is a huge breach. And his idea of a PR stunt is that ridiculous speech he gave last night. Trump is NOT playing 4D chess or even checkers.
Susie Wiles was under orders, from her supervisor Donald Trump, that it was a top priority for her to cooperate with Chris Whipple and not piss him off. So making it to a scheduled interview, with Chris Whipple, on time, really was an emergency.
As for what Wiles told Trump above, everything Susie relates is true except that she didn’t say “It doesn’t involve you.” That quote rings false to me. It’s not how she talks to Trump. And Wiles leaving did involve Trump, since she follows his orders. “It doesn’t involve you” was something Wiles made up to flatter Whipple. Only thing is, Whipple cannot be manipulated.
Trump and Maga live to own the libs. How can you possibly think Trump is/was afraid of pissing off Chris Whipple and Vanity Fair?
Trump does not play 4D chess, and he obviously cheats at checkers. @PhillyGuy Your hypothesis sorta kinda maybe makes sense if one has dosed on ketamine. But Trump back in his early days used to call NY tabloids pretending to be someone else (I can’t be bothered to find a cite) to get juicy gossip headlines about Trump. Exhibit B is Trump’s attempt to spin inflation the other night by chanelling Biden’s take on the economy. Ad nauseum.
FWIW, Trump told reporters he gave last night’s speech because Wiles told him he had to and that she’s staying in her job.
Following the brief address, Trump told reporters that his chief of staff informed him he “had” to give the address. Pressed as to whether she would stay in the role, the president said: “Yes. She’s doing a great job.”
So what do you make of Wiles’s story about leaving an Oval Office meeting, with the most important people in the White House, to walk down the hall into her own office to meet, in person, with Whipple?
My earlier hypothesis is so speculative and specific that I’d be shocked if it turned out to be 100% correct. But I do not think it is any more 4D chess than Trump’s phone call media manipulation attempts 30 or more years ago. I am missing the analogies between Trumpian media manipulation and board games.
Given what has happened at the Washington Post and CBS, I also question that Trumpian media manipulation always fails. Putin didn’t gain media control in just a few years either.
So her leaving the room for an interview implies only two things.
One, that she does this all the time, as a good chief of staff does. The White House has a million emergencies a day. The role of the Chief of Staff is to ensure that 999,999 of them don’t reach the president’s attention.
Two, she thought that the article in Vanity Fair would be great publicity for the president. Her giving eleven interviews and the top staff lining up for pretty pictures proves this.
Why she thought that is worth questioning. But all the answers are better than “Trump planned this.” Besides, if Trump had planned this she would have told him why she was leaving because that would show him his plan was working as scheduled.
