Ex-RFK Jr. Aide Goes Scorched Earth on Team Trump

MAHA stalwart Calley Means, who resigned from the Department of Health and Human Services two weeks ago, has accused former White House chief of staff Susie Wiles and her team of insiders of bowing to “unrelenting” pressure from industry lobbyists—and even profiting from it.

In a two-hour interview with pugnacious podcaster Joe Rogan Friday, Means claimed that Wiles had withheld support from MAHA policies in order to keep corporate cash flowing ahead of the midterm elections. He accused her team of bowing to heavy lobbying for fruit-flavored vapes and Kratom, also known as “gas station heroin.” Means also claimed that any corporation that hired her daughter, Katie Wiles, a partner at political lobbying firm Continental Strategy, received “high priority” at the White House.

Means’s accusations arrived as Donald Trump announced that Stephen Miller would replace Wiles as chief of staff, following sweeping Republican losses in the midterm elections. Means resigned as a top adviser to Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. last month, citing “a corrupt D.C. bureaucracy that is doing everything possible to protect the status quo.”

On Saturday, Means posted a public plea that Wiles and White House deputy chief of staff James Blair stop “harassing” him with texts and calls about his Rogan appearance. “If there is a factual inaccuracy in what I said, send it to me in writing and I will vigorously correct and apologize for any misstatements. I will note that everything I said is substantiated by other senior officials,” he wrote.

Behind the scenes, things quickly got ugly. “If you are gonna try to knife me, I’m happy to return the favor,” Blair told Means in a text message reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. Blair is reportedly considering suing Means for defamation.

Speaking on CBS News’s Face the Nation Sunday, Means accused Wiles of being part of a “close-knit crew” of former lobbyists in the White House who “explicitly catered to special interests against the will of the voters” without Trump’s full knowledge.

“I think [Trump] had severe poor advice from people, I think, who treated him like a baby in many respects, and used him,” Means said.

The group of insiders allegedly consisted of Wiles, Blair, Richard Walter (the deputy White House chief of staff who exited ahead of Miller’s appointment), and Walker Barrett, assistant to the president for policy.

Means claimed that the group was working on behalf of the industries Trump ran on fighting, including the vape industry, the ultraprocessed food industry, the pharmaceutical industry, and the pesticide industry. The president was unaware that some of his advisers were “directly” taking money from these industries, Means said.

Means also pointed the finger at Tony Fabrizio, the president’s personal pollster, for playing an outsize role in approving Trump administration policy while getting paid by companies such as Pfizer and Pepsi. “It’s a matter of record that Tony Fabrizio is in the pocket of big pharma,” Means told The Washington Post. Fabrizio told the Post that this was “not only ridiculous, but demonstrably false.”

The president is claiming he’ll take a softer tone on immigration now that Stephen Miller, his despotic deportation chief, is his chief of staff—and his longtime MAGA allies are not happy with the unexpected switch-up.

Donald Trump appeared decidedly more diplomatic as he plotted out his new position post-midterms during a sit-down 60 Minutes interview that aired Sunday. Speaking with host Ross Douthat, Trump singled out immigration as the one thing he’s looking forward to working on with the incoming Democratic majority in Congress, claiming that his previous positions were “too tough.”

“Do you think immigration hurt you in the midterms? Do you think the crackdown hurt you?” asked Douthat.

“I think it both helped and hurt,” Trump said, adding that he believed his deportation policies “hurt” him.

Then, in an incredible policy reversal, the president suggested that he could see a potentially viable pathway in which working, taxpaying, undocumented immigrants are offered a separate legal status.

“But there’s a group of people that I would say on the sort of pretty far right that would like everybody taken out,” Trump said.

“Do any of those people work in your administration? Are they in the building with us right now?” asked Douthat, to which Trump simply responded, “Yes.”

The interview was filmed an hour before news broke that Trump had tapped Miller to replace his notorious “ice maiden,” former White House chief of staff Susie Wiles. Trump had reportedly decided weeks earlier that Wiles would play the fall guy for Republican’s seismic midterm losses.

MAGA Republicans were aghast by the president’s newly sanitized take on his own immigration policies.

“Come again?” posted Fox News host Tomi Lahren, reacting to the interview clip.

“If President Trump softens on immigration enforcement, it will be a disaster,” commented former Trump adviser Steve Cortes.

“Stephen Miller needs to CLEAN HOUSE of advisors, because this is a HORRIBLE take,” wrote far-right commentator Nick Sortor. “WITHOUT DEPORTATIONS, OUR COUNTRY IS GONE. PERIOD. ICE IS NOT THE PROBLEM. THEY’RE THE SOLUTION.”

But it’s highly unlikely that Miller—the architect of some of Trump’s most horrific immigration policies—would actually bend to such an idea.

Miller was fundamental in crafting policies from Trump’s first term including separating families at the border, terminating the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program, and the executive orders that amounted to Trump’s Muslim ban. In May 2025, Miller issued a tyrannical order to his Immigration and Customs Enforcement underlings, directing them to arrest a minimum of 3,000 immigrants per day.

On its face, the duality appears to be an easy opportunity for Trump to sidestep blame (yet again) for his unpopular immigration policies, while still administratively green-lighting the agenda.

President Donald Trump had a tough time on CBS’s 60 Minutes trying to defend the massive increase in his wealth since the start of his second term.

In an interview that aired Sunday, interviewer Ross Douthat pointed out to the president that his net worth has gone up by $3 billion since January 2025, to which the president tried to argue that it was all because of his children. Trump then claimed that everyone’s wealth went up, prompting Douthat to note that he himself didn’t make $3 billion. Trump retorted, “You should have owned stock.”

“I devote almost no time to my net worth. I don’t care. I make, I have a lotta money, and far more than I ever thought I’d have. And I guess it’s gone up. I don’t even know. I have a son who’s a very straight, good guy. He watches over money. I don’t even talk to him about it. He watches. He gives, they gave my money, I have a lotta cash, have, had a lotta cash long before I came in here. I don’t take a salary, you know?” Trump said, trying to explain his newfound wealth.

Douthat also pointed out the apparent corruption from Trump’s cryptocurrency venture, World Liberty Financial, and how it took money from the United Arab Emirates. He pointed out that if President Joe Biden had done something similar, Trump would have called it corrupt. Trump tried to pin it all on his sons.

“I have, but you have sons where they go around and they build buildings. That’s what they do. That’s what I did long before I became president. I did it better than anybody. I was very good at real estate. I made a lotta money. But—but I have a company. My sons run the company. It’s hard to say to them, ‘Don’t do anything any more for four years because I’m president,’” Trump said.

In response to Douthat asking about outside forces who use Trump’s cryptocurrency for influence peddling, Trump tried to claim that every president has had a similar problem, “going back to George Washington.”

Trump has a lot to answer for with his business dealings, and seemed to crumble at the weakest amount of questioning over it. Douthat didn’t even mention the allegations of insider trading from within his administration, or the fact that Trump’s own Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has made suspicious stock trades as well. Here’s hoping that the pressure on Trump continues over the next two years, with more scrutiny, pressure, and revelations.

Republicans are already turning on Vice President JD Vance’s nascent presidential run, in favor of candidates from the Sunshine State.

As Election Day results rolled in last week, Vance received a text from one of his confidants advising him to consider sitting out of the next presidential race, The Wall Street Journal reported Saturday.

Within 24 hours of polls closing, one veteran New York fundraiser started to field calls from deep-pocketed donors who expressed concerns that they couldn’t possibly back Vance in 2028. A candidate sourced from within the Trump administration was too big a liability considering the sweeping rebuke of the president they’d just witnessed.

Vance has been desperate to paint Republican losses as the result of the war in Iran, and not Trump. But there’s enough evidence that Vance has become tainted by association. The vice president couldn’t even keep the GOP candidates in his home state of Ohio, let alone mount a national campaign, the fundraiser said. Other donors privately expressed similar concerns. Even Donald Trump appeared to be growing frustrated with Vance, telling reporters Sunday night that “a lot of people didn’t like his comments” about the effect of the Iran war.

“Not me,” Trump hastened to add.

Instead, Republican operatives are now looking to candidates from the lone red-wall state where the national blue wave didn’t reach: Florida. In the Sunshine State, there was less Republican participation overall, but GOP candidates still managed to hold onto the major seats of power.

Now GOP operatives are looking to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and Secretary of State Marco Rubio to take up the baton, Axios reported Sunday.

As Vance received a clear message urging him to stand down in 2028, Rubio’s phone “blew up” with messages saying the exact opposite, one source familiar with the scene told Axios.

“There was this sense of, ‘We lost the Latino vote, you can get it back, etc,’” the source said. “To some people, Rubio seemed to entertain the idea for the first time. Or he didn’t shut it down fast enough.”

Last week, multiple outlets reported that Rubio intended to step down to start mounting his own presidential campaign, but the secretary denied planning any such thing.

Meanwhile, DeSantis has already clearly positioned himself for a presidential run in 2028, Axios reported.

President Donald Trump scurried away from reporters Friday who asked about his new loser status.

Trump had an awkward interaction with reporters outside the White House after they asked him to explain his decision to replace chief of staff Susie Wiles with Stephen Miller.

“I wanted to make a change,” Trump said. The president had previously dismissed reporting that he was planning to oust his “ice maiden”—but that was before Republicans suffered staggering losses in the midterm elections this week.

“We gotta make moves, sometimes in life you gotta make moves,” Trump said.

“We’ve beaten Iran. We are doing very well with Iran, we are talking to Iran, we have been. We haven’t lost a soldier in seven months, or six months,” Trump said.

In July, just four months ago, Trump attended a funeral for four U.S. service members who were killed in Iranian attacks in the Middle East, amid reports accusing the Trump administration of hiding casualty numbers. As of October, 23 soldiers had died as a result of Trump’s disastrous military campaign.

Trump quickly departed from the press gaggle, as one reporter shouted after him, “How does it feel to lose?” The president continued to flee and did not respond.