Stephen Miller chief of staff move replaces Wiles after midterms

Trump said on Friday that the Stephen Miller chief of staff appointment will push Susie Wiles out, only days after the midterm rout.

Trump announced the change on his social media site. Miller starts on Monday, and Wiles moves over to the president’s political operation.

Why Trump made the Stephen Miller chief of staff move

Wiles gave up the post late on Thursday, a U.S. official told reporters, and a senior White House adviser said the same. Trump praised her outstanding work, and Wiles said Friday was her last day as chief of staff. Three sources tied it to the midterm defeats. It was unclear whether her deputies would stay at the White House.

She had planned to stay through the lame-duck session of Congress and leave around the end of the year or early next year. Trump moved her exit forward.

“I wanted to make a change,” the president told reporters. “Sometimes in life, you have to make moves,” he added, while he praised Wiles for a great job.

Wiles said on social media that serving Trump was the honour of a lifetime. She said her commitment to the president and the mission will not change.

Her departure also comes after she went public with a breast cancer diagnosis in March. She later said she no longer showed evidence of the disease.

Who Stephen Miller is

Few aides have stayed with Trump as long as Miller, or stood as close to him. He joined the 2016 campaign as a speechwriter and now serves as deputy chief of staff.

Miller once worked for Jeff Sessions, the hardliner who later served as Trump’s first attorney general. He also shaped the administration’s hard-line immigration policy and its deportation drive.

Trump called him very good politically and a great manager. In his own message, Miller thanked Wiles and promised to back the president and defend the republic with everything he has.

Wiles ran Trump’s 2024 campaign and has held the chief of staff post since his first day back in office. She was the first woman in that job and Trump’s longest-serving chief of staff.

Democrats react to the Stephen Miller chief of staff pick

Democrats quickly denounced the move. Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer wrote that “Donald Trump learned nothing from his historic defeat”.

House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries, who is likely to become speaker, attacked Miller in harsh terms. Rep. Robert Garcia, in line to chair the House Oversight Committee, said Miller “should lawyer up”.

Garcia said Oversight Democrats will keep investigating Miller. Senior Democrats promised more pressure when they take charge of Congress in January. The Stephen Miller chief of staff change also lands in a Washington that will soon share power.

The pick amounts to a doubling down on his approach, despite voters’ rejection of his agenda on Tuesday. Trump himself has said he can deal with the new Democratic leadership.

Still, the promotion may set up a much more combative relationship. For now, the Stephen Miller chief of staff change means the White House will keep its hard line.