Trump’s Own Chief Of Staff Unloads on Trump, Musk, Vance, and More
Susie Wiles compared Trump to an alcoholic and admitted his prosecutions ‘look vindictive,’ while slamming Elon Musk for destroying USAID.
The White House was sent scrambling Tuesday morning in an attempt to clean up the mess created by chief of staff Susie Wiles in an explosive, two-part interview with Vanity Fair’s Chris Whipple.
Over the course of 11 different meetings with Whipple, Wiles dished on those around her. She compared her boss, Donald Trump, to an alcoholic; indicated she unsuccessfully lobbied Trump not to pardon violent Jan. 6 rioters; suggested the administration should revise its cruel deportation policies; and slammed Elon Musk’s most destructive actions while working for Trump. She even admitted some of the president’s prosecutions “look vindictive.”
Wiles slammed the article as a “disingenuously framed hit piece on me and the finest President, White House staff, and Cabinet in history.” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt posted on X that “President Trump has no greater or more loyal advisor than Susie.”
And in an attempt to save her stature in the administration, Wiles argued, “Significant context was disregarded and much of what I, and others, said about the team and the President was left out of the story. I assume, after reading it, that this was done to paint an overwhelmingly chaotic and negative narrative about the President and our team.”
So here are 11 revelations, in Susie Wiles’s own words, that paint a picture of what, exactly, is going on inside the Trump administration.
On Dismantling USAID
Wiles came out swinging when asked about Elon Musk’s dismantling of the US Agency for International Development, the American foreign aid bureau, stating, “No rational person could think the USAID process was a good one. Nobody.” She said USAID was doing “very good work.”
Under Musk’s leadership, Trump’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, shuttered USAID, before its remains were folded into the State Department. Researchers have suggested that Trump’s USAID cuts could lead to more than 14 million deaths globally, including 4.5 million children under the age of 5 by 2030.
On Donald Trump
Wiles described Trump as having “an alcoholic’s personality.” She added that he “operates [with] a view that there’s nothing he can’t do. Nothing, zero, nothing.”
Oddly, she might not have meant for this to sound like a bad thing, as she said that “high-functioning alcoholics or alcoholics in general, their personalities are exaggerated when they drink. And so I’m a little bit of an expert in big personalities.”
On the other hand, Trump’s brother was an alcoholic and died young at 42. The president has said he was “scarred” by his brother’s struggles, which is why he’s never touched alcohol.
On Jan. 6 Pardons
Wiles initially pushed back on Trump’s idea to pardon all of the Jan. 6 insurrectionists: “I said, ‘I am on board with the people that were happenstancers or didn’t do anything violent. And we certainly know what everybody did because the FBI has done such an incredible job.’”
But she ultimately gave in to Trump’s wishes. “In 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,” she told Vanity Fair.
On JD Vance
Wiles listed Vice President JD Vance as among those within the Trump administration who “really appreciated” how much of a “big deal” the Epstein Files are to the MAGA base, describing him as someone who has been a “conspiracy theorist for a decade.”
On Elon Musk
Speaking of Elon Musk, who led Trump’s DOGE operation before a public falling out with the president, Wiles described Musk as an avowed ketamine” user. She said that Musk “sleeps in a sleeping bag in the EOB [Executive Office Building] in the daytime. And he’s an odd, odd duck, as I think geniuses are. You know, it’s not helpful, but he is his own person.”
Musk, the world’s richest man, denied using ketamine after a New York Times report earlier this year alleged his heavy use of the substance was affecting his bladder.
Wiles denied saying Musk uses ketamine. Whipple provided a recording confirming the quote to the Times.
On Deportations
After the Trump administration illegally deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia to prison in El Salvador, Wiles told Vanity Fair, “I will concede that we’ve got to look harder at our process for deportation.”
She added, “If somebody is a known gang member who has a criminal past, and you’re sure, and you can demonstrate it, it’s probably fine to send them to El Salvador or whatever… But if there is a question, I think our process has to lean toward a double-check.”
The Trump administration sent hundreds of Venezuelans to a notorious megaprison in El Salvador, claiming they were terrorist gang members. The vast majority of the men had no criminal convictions.
On Tariffs
Wiles admitted there was “huge disagreement” within the administration over whether Trump’s tariffs, or import taxes, were “a good idea.” She said that she and Vance tried to persuade Trump to hold off on issuing the tariffs, but he went on ahead and announced massive, supposedly reciprocal, tariffs on many countries.
Trump issued these tariffs with little actual basis or authority, and he has frequently shifted them, without any apparent rhyme or reason.
“It’s been more painful than I expected,” Wiles acknowledged.
On the Epstein Files
Speaking of Jeffrey Epstein, the late sex offender and former friend of Trump, Wiles told Vanity Fair, “Whether he was an American CIA asset, a Mossad asset, whether all these rich, important men went to that nasty island and did unforgivable things to young girls, I mean, I kind of knew it, but it’s never anything I paid a bit of attention to.”
As for Trump’s relationship with Epstein, Wiles conceded, “[Trump] is in the file. And we know he’s in the file. And he’s not in the file doing anything awful.”
She chalked up Trump’s relationship with Epstein as nothing but boys being boys: “They were, you know, sort of young, single, whatever – I know it’s a passé word but sort of young, single playboys together.”
Trump has often tried to shift attention to former President Bill Clinton when asked about the Epstein files. He recently claimed that Clinton visited Epstein’s private island 28 times. Wiles pushed back on this notion, saying “there is no evidence” those visits happened. “The president was wrong about that,” she added.
On Venezuela
The Trump administration has claimed that the US’s strikes on alleged drug boats off the coast of Venezuela are part of a larger effort to curb drug trafficking into the United States.
However, Wiles openly contradicted this stance, making clear it’s about toppling Nicolás Maduro’s regime in Venezuela. She told Vanity Fair that Trump “wants to keep on blowing boats up until Maduro cries uncle. And people way smarter than me on that say that he will.”
While Trump hasn’t ruled out sending ground troops to Venezuela, Wiles acknowledged the president cannot legally go to war there without authorization from Congress. She said, “If he were to authorize some activity on land, then it’s war, then [we’d need] Congress.”
Wiles indicated the White House is, indeed, trying to make its case to Congress for a war. “Marco and JD, to some extent, are up on the Hill every day, briefing,” she said.
On a Third Term
Since taking office, Trump has repeatedly floated the idea of running for a third term.
However, Wiles told Vanity Fair that she believes the 22nd Amendment rules out the possibility of Trump seeking a third term, and that Trump himself agrees.
She revealed, “Sometimes he laments, ‘You know, gosh, I feel like we’re doing really well. I wish I could run again.’ And then he immediately says, ‘Not really. I will have served two terms and I will have gotten done what I need to get done, and it’s time to give somebody else a chance.’ So, you know, any given day, right? But he knows he can’t run again.”
On Retribution
Wiles acknowledged that some of Trump’s overtly political efforts to punish his enemies may look like “vindictive” prosecutions.
Asked about Trump’s flailing attempt to prosecute New York Attorney General Letitia James, Wiles acknowledged that case “might be the one retribution.”
Pressed later about Trump’s shambolic efforts to prosecute former FBI director James Comey, Wiles said, “I mean, people could think it does look vindictive. I can’t tell you why you shouldn’t think that.” She added, “I don’t think he wakes up thinking about retribution. But when there’s an opportunity, he will go for it.”
Back in March, Wiles told Vanity Fair that she and Trump “have a loose agreement that the score settling will end before the first 90 days are over.”
But when the reporter followed up five months later, Wiles argued, “I don’t think he’s on a retribution tour. A governing principle for him is, ‘I don’t want what happened to me to happen to somebody else.’ And so people that have done bad things need to get out of the government. In some cases, it may look like retribution. And there may be an element of that from time to time. Who would blame him? Not me.”
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Thanks for the outtakes of Susie Wiles' interview in Vanity Fair. It doesn't sound like she's had much influence in reining the president in. She laments some of his decisions and begrudgingly goes along with others. What is it that she actually gets done?
"Young, single playboys together." Gross. If there's nothing incriminating about him in the Epstein files, why is he working so hard to hide them? Her whole take on his vindictiveness seems to be, "That's just Trump being Trump, and I'm fine with it."