Dem
54
Ties
2
GOP
44
We wrote yesterday that while Harmeet Dhillon might be the first rat to depart the S.S. Trump, she would not be the last. We thought one of the Cabinet secretaries would go next, but it was actually one of our runners-up who was given their pink slip late Friday: Chief of Staff Susie Wiles.
The grim reaper who de facto swung the ax is Stephen Miller, which is appropriate, since he certainly looks the part. He has been undermining Wiles for many months, and has managed to persuade Donald Trump that the midterm fiasco was somehow her fault. Exactly how that logic works, we do not know. That said, Trump never blames himself, even when the fault is 100% his, and he loves to scapegoat women staffers. So, it's not too surprising that Wiles got broomed.
Miller is not only the primary instigator of Wiles' demise, he is also going to be her replacement. If Trump wanted to make clear that he absolutely did not get the message the voters sent on Tuesday, he could scarcely have done better than to elevate Miller. Speaking in specific terms, the GOP took a thrashing in Texas, in particular, because Latinos turned blue in response to ICE and the unduly harsh immigration policy. Elevating the nation's #1 xenophobe, and the foremost architect of that policy, is not going to please those Latino voters, that is for sure.
Speaking in more general terms, it is clear that the voters are tired of the divisiveness and the dysfunction. That's why there are so many "a pox on both of your houses" polls that show the voters don't like either party. We stand by our view that, because Donald Trump is not an ideologue, the soon-to-be Democratic majority could find areas of agreement with him. But the dismissal of Wiles and the elevation of Miller is reminiscent of the scene in The Godfather where Michael Corleone demotes Tom Hagen because he's not a wartime consigliere. Wiles was not a wartime consigliere. Miller is. And clearly, a bunker mentality is settling in at the White House, and the administration is preparing for all-out war against the Democratic-controlled Congress.
It is at least possible that, once the hurt of this week has faded, Trump & Miller could calm down a bit, and be more willing to act like adults and actually govern. But we are not sanguine about that. Miller, who is in the running for the title of "most evil man in America," is perpetually in a state of rage, and does not particularly care if he burns the whole thing down. Meanwhile, he is also the most talented Trump whisperer in the administration, and he is not terribly likely to be removed against his will. So, one has to assume that for the balance of Trump v2.0, America's answer to Attila the Hun is going to be calling the shots at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. And the more disinterested Trump gets, or the more Trump declines cognitively, the more Miller's power grows.
This almost certainly isn't the end of the bloodshed, either. Just hours before cashiering Wiles, Trump sat for an interview with 60 Minutes in which he said he planned to shake things up, and implied that several Cabinet departments will have new leadership. There is motivation for him to move fast on that; not only can he vent some of the rage he's feeling right now, but he'll have a more pliable Senate (ostensibly) for the next 6 weeks or so. Once the Democrats take over, Trump has zero hope of, for example, installing another MAHA loon at HHS, or another testosterone bro at DoD.
Note that Miller's actual job is chief of staff. That is a management position in which he has to manage all the White House staffers, many of whom are busy knifing other White House staffers. It will be Miller's job to contain the infighting and make sure everyone is doing whatever their job is. There is no reason to believe that Miller is any good at managing people at all, so the infighting is only going to get worse.
In short, buckle up, because it's going to be a bumpy ride. (Z)