Stephen Miller used his first public remarks since being named White House chief of staff to tell a room full of conservatives that America would be gone without Trump. “If it wasn’t for President Trump, the United States of America would not exist right now,” Miller said at a CPAC event at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s private club in Palm Beach. “This man saved America.”
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Trump announced Friday that Miller will replace Susie Wiles as chief of staff starting Monday. The chief of staff runs the White House day to day, controls who and what reaches the president, and is often the most powerful unelected person in the building. Miller had been serving as deputy chief of staff for policy and is best known as the architect of the administration’s hardline immigration agenda. The move came three days after Democrats flipped control of both the House and the Senate in the midterms.
Miller did not mention the election results. Instead, he walked through what he described as Trump’s rescue of the country. “He saved our military from collapse. He saved our economy from destruction. He saved our border from annihilation,” Miller said, adding that Trump protected the nation from threats “which would have been the end of the American dream forever.”
He also pointed to Trump’s personal and legal battles as sacrifices made for his supporters. “This man took a bullet for us. He faced down life in prison for us,” Miller said. The first line refers to the July 2024 assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania, where a gunman’s bullet grazed Trump’s ear. The second refers to the four criminal cases Trump faced before returning to office, including his 2024 conviction on 34 felony counts in New York.
Miller went on to credit Trump with saving the Republican Party “from the ash heap of history,” saying he made it “stronger, more popular, and more resilient than ever before.” That claim lands days after the party lost its majorities in Congress.
Miller has been with Trump from the start. “It was the privilege of a lifetime to join President Trump all the way back in 2015 when he came down that golden escalator,” he said, referring to the Trump Tower escalator ride that kicked off Trump’s first presidential campaign.
He closed with a pledge aimed directly at his new boss. “It is the honor of my life to be President Trump’s chief of staff, and I swear to you, and I pledge to you, Mr. President, my absolute loyalty, my unwavering commitment, and my total devotion to your success and the success of this country.”
Wiles, who ran Trump’s 2024 campaign before becoming chief of staff, is moving over to Trump’s political operation.
