Recently, President Donald Trump gave an 18-minute prime-time speech that left many questioning its impact.
The address was brief, but it did little to win back support. Conservative broadcaster David Brody called it “a waste of time.” Trump spent much of the speech blaming President Joe Biden for his own challenges, while supporters appeared underwhelmed.
After the speech, Trump reportedly turned to White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and asked how he did. According to reports, Wiles replied, “‘I told you 20 minutes and you were 20 minutes on the dot.’”
On their latest podcast, New York Times writers Jamelle Bouie, Michelle Cottle, and David French talked about what happened.
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Cottle said: “One of the things that sort of struck me — the morning-after coverage of this, some media person who was in the room was saying that Trump looked to Susie Wiles, his chief of staff, and asked how he did. And she’s like, Well, I told you 20 minutes and you were spot on, so well done. So I got the sense that they had handed him this thing and told him to keep it short.”
Bouie added: “Well, I think that the aim is just to give him something to do. You put him out there to give this 20-minute harangue, and then you tell him it was great and everyone loved it and this’ll turn things around, and then he just goes back to going to his clubs and hanging out in the Oval Office.”
Cottle joked: “But I thought it was pretty magical.”
White House aides have repeatedly said Wiles keeps the administration running smoothly. She manages the daily operations of the White House and helps coordinate the president’s schedule. But this incident shows that keeping Trump busy sometimes involves more than just strategy.
Wiles is credited with order and control, but controversy seems to follow her too.
Wiles herself told Vanity Fair: “Yes, I do. We have a loose agreement that the score settling will end before the first 90 days are over.”
On the idea of retribution, she added: “I don’t think he’s on a retribution tour. A governing principle for him is, ‘I don’t want what happened to me to happen to somebody else.’ And so people that have done bad things need to get out of the government. In some cases, it may look like retribution. And there may be an element of that from time to time. Who would blame him? Not me.”
The 18-minute speech was just one example of the behind-the-scenes work Trump’s aides do.
Featured image via Political Tribune Gallery
