New reporting from a Vanity Fair profile of White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles—amplified by analysis in The Nation and an NPR interview with writer Chris Whipple—details her unusually frank assessments of Donald Trump and his inner circle, her comments about a ‘revenge tour,’ and her description of U.S. strikes on boats near Venezuela that appear to conflict with the administration’s stated anti‑drug rationale.
White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, widely described as the most powerful aide in Donald Trump’s second administration, became the focus of intense scrutiny after a lengthy Vanity Fair profile based on 11 interviews she granted to writer Chris Whipple over roughly a year. According to NPR’s Fresh Air conversation with Whipple and Wiles’ own taped remarks cited by The Nation, those interviews ranged from her views of Trump and his top officials to the administration’s Venezuela policy and domestic programs. (kenw.org)
The profile and subsequent commentary note that Wiles is the first woman to serve as White House chief of staff, a role she assumed after Trump’s 2024 reelection, and that she had previously kept a relatively low public profile despite holding what The Nation calls “the most important position in the White House next to the president himself.” (thenation.com)
According to The Nation’s summary of Whipple’s reporting, Wiles told Vanity Fair that Trump has “an alcoholic’s personality,” a comparison she said she could recognize because her father, the late football player and broadcaster Pat Summerall, struggled with alcoholism. Trump does not drink, but Wiles suggested his grandiosity and intensity reminded her of addictive behavior. (thenation.com)
The same article reports that Wiles offered sharp, on‑the‑record characterizations of several senior figures. She described Vice President JD Vance as having been “a conspiracy theorist for a decade” and suggested his shift from Trump critic to Trump ally was “sort of political.” She reportedly called Elon Musk, who oversees a restructured development and foreign‑aid apparatus, “an avowed Ketamine [user]” and “an odd, odd duck,” speculating that a particularly extreme political post might have come while he was microdosing. She also labeled budget chief Russell Vought “a right‑wing absolute zealot.” (thenation.com)
On Trump’s posture toward political opponents, The Nation writes that Wiles acknowledged his efforts to pursue figures such as former FBI director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James were driven in part by score‑settling and retribution. NPR’s Fresh Air segment with Whipple similarly notes that Wiles discussed what she and Whipple both referred to as Trump’s “revenge tour,” though the segment and The Nation piece do not document a specific 90‑day time limit or a formal internal pact capping such efforts. (thenation.com)
The Nation also reports that Wiles sought at times to distance herself from some of Trump’s most controversial moves. She is quoted as saying she was “initially aghast” at Musk’s plans to sharply cut funding for USAID, because she believed the agency “do[es] very good work,” and as expressing discomfort with Trump’s pardons of certain January 6 rioters and with what she called “overzealous” actions by Border Patrol agents. (thenation.com)
Wiles offered pointed criticism of Attorney General Pam Bondi’s handling of Jeffrey Epstein‑related files. According to The Nation’s account of the Vanity Fair interviews, she said Bondi “completely whiffed” on recognizing how politically salient the case was, first producing “binders full of nothingness” and then claiming that a supposed witness or client list was on her desk. Wiles is quoted as saying flatly, “There is no client list, and it sure as hell wasn’t on her desk.” (thenation.com)
On Trump’s past relationship with Epstein, The Nation reports that Wiles confirmed Trump flew on Epstein’s plane and characterized their relationship as that of “young, single playboys together.” She also indicated, according to the same article, that the documents Bondi reviewed did not contain incriminating material about Trump or about Bill Clinton, undercutting Trump’s own public insinuations about Clinton’s ties to Epstein. (thenation.com)
Some of Wiles’ most politically explosive comments concern Venezuela. Jeet Heer’s piece in The Nation, drawing directly on quotations from Whipple’s Vanity Fair article, notes that since September 2 the Trump administration has been “bombing boats in the Caribbean and Pacific Oceans on the pretext of combating drug trafficking.” Wiles is quoted in that coverage as saying of Trump, “[He] wants to keep on blowing boats up until [Venezuelan President Nicolás] Maduro cries uncle. And people way smarter than me on that say that he will.” The Nation argues that this undercuts the administration’s public justification of the strikes as purely anti‑narcotics operations. (thenation.com)
The same Nation article reports that Trump recently announced a naval blockade of Venezuela until, in his words, the country returns “all of the Oil, Land, and other Assets that they previously stole from us.” That escalation, The Nation contends, reinforces Wiles’ implication that regime change and economic leverage—not just counternarcotics—have driven the policy. However, neither The Nation nor NPR’s Fresh Air transcript documents Wiles specifying the number of casualties from the boat strikes or providing a detailed operational timeline beyond the September 2 start date. (thenation.com)
According to The Nation and other outlets summarizing the Vanity Fair piece, Wiles has tried to cast herself as a kind of internal guardrail while still vigorously advancing Trump’s agenda. She is portrayed as acknowledging Trump’s vengeful streak and chaotic governing style, even as she emphasizes her role in managing and sometimes moderating his impulses. NPR notes that Whipple’s interviews probed both her criticisms and her continuing loyalty, including her insistence that she remains committed to helping Trump succeed in office. (thenation.com)
As reaction to the Vanity Fair article spread, Wiles publicly complained that Whipple’s story was a “hit piece” that misframed her comments. The Nation reports that she made that charge even as she and the White House did not contest specific factual assertions. Whipple, for his part, told The New York Times and reiterated on social media that he had tapes of the interviews, and The Nation notes that when Wiles tried to deny calling Musk a ketamine user, Whipple played audio contradicting her. (thenation.com)
Despite the furor, senior officials have so far rallied around Wiles. The Nation cites a statement from White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt on X praising Wiles for helping Trump achieve “the most successful first 11 months in office of any President in American history” and asserting that “President Trump has no greater or more loyal advisor than Susie.” Coverage in other outlets has likewise stressed that Trump continues to value Wiles’ political instincts and management skills, and that she is expected to remain in her post. (thenation.com)
Overall, the emerging picture from Whipple’s Vanity Fair profile and subsequent reporting is of a chief of staff who is simultaneously central to Trump’s power structure and surprisingly blunt about his conduct and that of his lieutenants—particularly on issues ranging from personal behavior and internal feuds to the administration’s aggressive posture toward Venezuela.
