Congress
Get your Susie Wiles fix here
The hottest ticket in town is about to be Susie Wiles’ cell phone number.
There are many reasons why Trump chose Wiles, who will be the first woman to hold the job, as his chief of staff. She largely eschews the spotlight — except for when she’s hitting back at Mark Cuban for saying Trump doesn’t have “strong, intelligent women” around him. It’s a trait that has made her an effective operator and helped keep her in Trump’s good graces. (When Trump called her onstage to speak at his victory party, she politely declined. “Susie likes to stay in the background. She’s not in the background,” he said.)
She is one of the few top officials to survive an entire Trump campaign and was part of the team that put together a far more professional operation for his third White House bid — even if the former president routinely broke through those guardrails, anyway.
People close to Trump note that she agreed to help the former president back in March of 2021 when he was at a political low point, and he respects her opinion. Plus, she is the rare person in Trump’s world who is widely admired, trusted and respected by lawmakers and young staffers alike.
5 things to know about her, at a glance:
- Her experience is in running campaigns — not the government.
- She’s worked for a spectrum of Republicans, from Mitt Romney to Rick Scott.
- She turned Trump’s dysfunctional political universe into something organized.
- She is a longtime lobbyist and her clients included the tobacco company Swisher International while simultaneously running the Trump campaign.
- She is the daughter of legendary sportscaster Pat Summerall.
What some of the Trump surrogates have said:
- Former Speaker Kevin McCarthy, who remains in touch with Trump, recently advocated for Wiles on the “Guy Benson Show,” saying she would be a “great chief of staff and should do the job.”
- Charlie Kirk, the influential conservative podcaster and Turning Point USA founder who campaigned extensively for Trump, agreed in a post on X: “Susie Wiles ran Trump’s best campaign of the three. … She’s disciplined, she’s smart, and she doesn’t seek the limelight. She would make an incredible chief of staff.” He was quickly backed up by Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida, where Wiles rose through the ranks as an operative.
- “Susie is the only one who can do it,” said one Trump adviser who was granted anonymity to speak candidly. “Susie is the one that everyone respects.”
And ICYMI: Our own Michael Kruse’s long-read magazine piece from earlier this year: The Most Feared and Least Known Political Operative in America
A version of this report first appeared in West Wing Playbook, your guide to the preparations, personnel decisions and policy deliberations of Donald Trump’s presidential transition. Sign up to get it in your inbox every weekday.
Congress
Luna pushes to force a vote banning congressional stock trading
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) said in a brief interview Tuesday that she’s pushing forward with a discharge petition to end run Speaker Mike Johnson and force a vote on a congressional stock trading ban.
The politically-explosive topic is still divisive within House Republicans, but broadly popular with the public. Luna said she’s done with waiting around for accountability on Capitol Hill.
Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.), who is working on the effort with Luna, said they are “tired” of the GOP leaders pushing off the legislation.
It’s just the latest internal GOP fight facing Johnson. Almost simultaneously Tuesday afternoon, Johnson faced a GOP revolt on the House floor over a procedural move involving legislation to regulate name, image and likeness compensation in college sports.
Congress
Thune says abortion language a sticking point in health care talks
Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Tuesday that while bipartisan discussions are ongoing around the fate of soon-to-expire Affordable Care Act subsidies, abortion restrictions are a major sticking point.
“There are conversations that continue, but as you know the Hyde issue is a difficult and challenging one on both sides,” Thune told reporters.
The fight over the so-called Hyde Amendment, which bars federal funding for abortion, has been looming over any potential deal to extend the enhanced Obamacare tax credits. And GOP lawmakers, not to mention a cadre of influential anti-abortion groups, quickly noticed the White House’s framework was silent on the issue.
The White House ultimately held off on releasing that framework as it faced a mountain of GOP criticism from conservatives who felt caught off guard that Trump would back a two-year extension of the subsidies — even when paired with new income caps and other restrictions.
The Senate is expected to vote next week on a proposal from Democrats to extend the ACA subsidies, but Democrats haven’t yet detailed what bill they will put on the chamber floor.
Republicans are separately working on a potential counterproposal that would come from Sens. Mike Crapo and Bill Cassidy, chairs of the Senate Finance and HELP Committees, respectively. GOP senators also have yet to decide whether they’ll roll out that plan in time for a vote next week, though, and the substance remains in flux.
Sens. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) said Monday night that while efforts to reach a bipartisan agreement persist, many lawmakers believe they are ultimately headed toward a failed vote next week. Some senators are already looking at Jan. 30, the next government funding deadline, as the real cut-off for a health care deal.
“I don’t think we’re close to a 60-vote threshold yet,” Thune said of bipartisan health care talks.
There’s also uncertainty on the other side of the Capitol about how Republicans will respond to the looming expiration of the subsidies, which could cause premiums to skyrocket in the new year. Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters at his weekly press conference that he “didn’t commit to” a short-term extension during a closed-door House GOP members’ meeting Tuesday morning but that “there will be a Republican response to this.”
“What I’ve got to do is build consensus deliberately around the best ideas,” Johnson said. “We’re pulling those ideas together … I can’t project in advance what that will be because I don’t know what the consensus is in that room.”
Meredith Lee Hill contributed to this report.
Congress
Stefanik accuses Johnson of lying, ‘blocking’ her defense bill provision
Rep. Elise Stefanik is taking aim directly at Speaker Mike Johnson over signals a provision she has championed won’t be included in the annual defense policy bill the House wants to pass next week — marking a notable and unusual split inside the House GOP leadership team.
Stefanik, a New York Republican who serves as a member of Johnson’s leadership team, said in a social media post Tuesday morning she would help tank the National Defense Authorization Act if it doesn’t incorporate her provision that would require the FBI to notify Congress when it opens investigations into candidates running for federal office.
“This is an easy one,” the New York Republican posted on social media Tuesday morning. “This bill is DOA unless this provision gets added in as it was passed out of committee.”
Stefanik also blamed Johnson for the expected omission.
“[T]he Speaker is blocking my provision to root out the illegal weaponization that led to Crossfire Hurricane, Arctic Frost, and more,” she wrote on X. “He is siding with Jamie Raskin against Trump Republicans to block this provision to protect the deep state.”
Stefanik’s proposal, which would require the public disclosure of all “FBI counterintelligence investigations into presidential and federal candidates seeking office,” is designed to combat what many Republicans consider politically motivated investigations related to Russian interference in the 2016 election and former special counsel Jack Smith’s probe into President Donald Trump’s efforts to subvert the election in 2020.
Asked about whether he thwarted the provision’s inclusion in the NDAA, Johnson said Stefanik’s retelling of events is “false.” He said he supported the provision and that there could still be a path for its passage in some other legislative vehicle.
“I don’t exactly know why Elise just won’t call me,” he said, recalling that he told his colleague over text, “What are you talking about? This hasn’t even made it to my level.”
Johnson explained the bipartisan leaders of the House and Senate Judiciary Committees, who he suspected have jurisdiction over this issue, had not agreed to include the language, leading to the provision being dropped from the defense bill. A spokesperson for Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary panel, deferred to Johnson’s explanation.
Stefanik quickly responded in another post on X, “Just more lies from the Speaker,” while insisting the Intelligence Committee, on which Stefanik sits, has jurisdiction over her provision.
Leaders of the House and Senate Armed Services Committees have been negotiating the NDAA for weeks and could roll out a compromise package as soon as Thursday; Stefanik said in her social media post that she got early details of that package in an Intelligence Committee briefing.
The narrow GOP majority in the House means that Johnson can barely afford to lose any Republican support if Democrats reject the legislation en masse, but it’s far from guaranteed Stefanik’s opposition will doom the NDAA on its own.
While most Democrats opposed the hard-right version of the Pentagon bill the House passed in September, more Democrats might come on board to support a compromise measure and make up for a shortfall of votes on the Republican side of the aisle. The NDAA is typically a broadly bipartisan package.
Connor O’Brien contributed to this report.
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