Susie Wiles, President Trump’s chief of staff, gave a remarkably candid look inside the White House in a series of interviews with Vanity Fair published Tuesday — offering some of the most unfiltered comments yet from someone at the very center of Trump’s second term.
Across multiple conversations throughout the year, Wiles spoke openly about President Trump’s personality, Elon Musk’s behavior, internal chaos at USAID, Vice President JD Vance’s political evolution, the Epstein files controversy, U.S. boat strikes tied to Venezuela, and even whether Trump might try to bypass the 22nd Amendment.
Taken together, the interviews paint a raw picture of power, tension, and unpredictability inside the administration.
Wiles also delivered blunt assessments of major figures around Trump, including Elon Musk, Attorney General Pam Bondi, and Office of Management and Budget director Russell Vought, whom she described as “a right-wing absolute zealot.” While she dismissed speculation that Trump would attempt to run for a third term, she admitted he enjoys the reaction the idea provokes. “But he sure is having fun with it,” she said, adding that he knows it’s “driving people crazy.”
After publication, Wiles pushed back hard, calling the two-part profile a “disingenuously framed hit piece.” In her first post on X in more than a year, she said key context was ignored to portray the White House as chaotic and negative.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt defended Wiles, calling her Trump’s “most loyal advisor,” while Donald Trump Jr. said no one was more qualified to serve as chief of staff.
Here are six of the most striking moments from the profile:
1. Trump “has an alcoholic’s personality”
Wiles compared Trump’s personality to that of her late father, NFL legend Pat Summerall, whom she once helped stage an intervention for.
While Trump has famously avoided alcohol his entire life, Wiles said he shares certain traits common to alcoholics.
“High-functioning alcoholics or alcoholics in general, their personalities are exaggerated when they drink,” she said. “And so I’m a little bit of an expert in big personalities.”
She added that Trump operates with the belief that “there’s nothing he can’t do — nothing, zero, nothing.”
2. Elon Musk is an “odd, odd duck”
Wiles described Musk, who oversaw major government downsizing, as an “avowed” ketamine user who slept in a sleeping bag inside the Executive Office Building during the day.
“The challenge with Elon is keeping up with him,” she said. “He’s an odd, odd duck, as I think geniuses are.”
She said she was initially “aghast” by Musk’s decision to dismantle USAID, adding that “no rational person” could think the process was handled well. According to Wiles, there are details about the fallout that the president “doesn’t know and never will.”
3. She’d back JD Vance for president in 2028
Wiles said she would be “one of the first people” to support Vice President JD Vance if he runs for president in 2028, adding that she believes he would win the GOP nomination.
She described Vance’s shift from a Never Trumper to a committed MAGA supporter as “sort of political.” While discussing the Epstein files, she also noted that Vance has been a “conspiracy theorist for a decade.”
Vance, for his part, praised Wiles in the profile, saying she doesn’t try to control or manipulate Trump the way some first-term staffers did.
“Susie just takes the diametrically opposite viewpoint,” Vance said.
4. Trump and Epstein were “young, single playboys together”
Wiles acknowledged that Trump appears in what she called “the Epstein file,” but insisted he is not documented doing anything “awful.”
She said Trump and Jeffrey Epstein were “young, single playboys together” and denied claims that Trump drew a nude sketch for Epstein’s 50th birthday.
She also said Trump was wrong to claim there was incriminating evidence against former President Bill Clinton, stating there is “no evidence” Clinton visited Epstein’s private island.
Wiles sharply criticized Attorney General Pam Bondi’s handling of the Epstein records, saying she “completely whiffed” by distributing “binders full of nothingness” and falsely claiming a client list existed.
5. Boat strikes are about Maduro — not drugs
Wiles contradicted the administration’s public messaging on deadly boat strikes, saying Trump’s real goal is to pressure Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
“He wants to keep on blowing boats up until Maduro cries uncle,” she said, adding that experts believe it could work.
The administration has said the strikes are aimed at stopping drug trafficking, not removing Maduro. Wiles acknowledged that attacks on Venezuelan mainland targets would require congressional approval.
6. Trump still leans toward retribution
Wiles said she and Trump had a “loose agreement” to move past “score settling” within the first 90 days of his term.
“I don’t think he wakes up thinking about retribution,” she said. “But when there’s an opportunity, he will go for it.”
She admitted that the prosecution of New York Attorney General Letitia James was retribution and conceded that targeting former FBI Director James Comey “does look vindictive.”
In November, a federal judge dismissed Trump’s indictments of both Comey and James. While Bondi pledged to appeal, the Justice Department has not yet done so.
Taken together, Wiles’ remarks offer one of the clearest — and most unsettling — windows yet into how power is exercised inside Trump’s White House.
