Who is Susie Wiles, America’s first ever female chief-of-staff?
Donald Trump has named Susie Wiles as his White House chief of staff in his first major appointment as president-elect.
She will be the first female in history to take up the role – one of the most important non-elected posts in Washington.
In his victory speech, Mr Trump described her as an “ice maiden” and has credited her with his “best-run” campaign.
Here’s what we know about her so far.
Daughter of American footballer
Susie Wiles grew up in New Jersey. Her father was the late American footballer Pat Summerall.
Before his death in 2013, he credited her with helping him get sober and checking in to an alcohol rehab programme.
“I hadn’t been there much for my kids,” he wrote in his memoir. “But Susan’s letter made it clear that I’d hurt them even in my absence.”
Ms Wiles’s first job in politics was in the 1970s as an assistant to the late Jack Kemp, who became a Republican representative for New York after playing alongside her father at the New York Giants.
Pic: AP
Read more
How Trump 2.0 will differ from first presidency
What is the 4B movement?
Biden tells Americans to come together
The now 67-year-old was later part of Ronald Reagan’s presidential campaign and subsequently worked as a White House scheduler during his term.
Following the Reagan administration, in 1988 she worked on the vice-presidential campaign for George H W Bush’s deputy Dan Quayle.
Having moved to Florida, she worked as an adviser to two Jacksonville mayors.
Outside politics she has worked in the private sector as a lobbyist, for both Ballard Partners, whose clients include Amazon, Google, and the MLB (Major League Baseball), and then Mercury, who works with Elon Musk’s SpaceX and the Embassy of Qatar.
On her appointment to the Trump team, Mercury chief executive Keiran Mahoney said: “This is great news for the country. Susie has been a valued colleague. We are all proud of her and wish her the best.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Who will be in Trump’s top team?
From DeSantis to Trump
In recent years, Ms Wiles has worked for some of the Republicans’ more divisive figures.
After helping Rick Scott become governor of Florida in 2010, she worked on Mr Trump’s 2016 campaign there.
With the Sunshine State win credited with helping Mr Trump take the White House, Ms Wiles was brought in to help Ron DeSantis’s ailing campaign to replace Mr Scott as governor in 2018.
Read more:
What is Project 2025?
Will White House be a family business?
What happens before Trump is sworn in?
The pair are reported to have fallen out after he was elected, which was seemingly confirmed when Ms Wiles was in charge of Mr Trump’s 2024 bid. Mr DeSantis was up against Mr Trump in the primaries, but was widely ridiculed and forced to pull out early on.
It was later claimed that Ms Wiles was behind some of the media stories that made fun of Mr DeSantis.
Pic: AP
‘Ice maiden’
Although unsuccessful, Mr Trump credited Ms Wiles with being an “integral” part of his second presidential bid in 2020.
She was co-manager of his effort this year alongside Chris LaCivita.
After her appointment this week, he described her as the “perfect pick” with a “master ability to manage multiple things of significance simultaneously”.
During the campaign, she also lobbied for the tobacco company Swisher International.
👉 Listen to Sky News Daily on your podcast app 👈
Throughout her decades-long political career, Ms Wiles has stayed out of the limelight and scarcely engaged with the media.
Speaking to the Tampa Bay Times in 2016, she hit back at criticism of Mr Trump’s inflammatory rhetoric.
“I will tell you this: The Donald Trump that I have come to know does not behave that way, and the lens that I look at him through, I don’t see any of that. I see strengths, I see smarts, I see a work ethic that is unparalleled,” she told the newspaper.
She is believed to have been behind the campaign material that targeted Latino and black voters, who were key in taking votes from the Democrats.
At a rally in Milwaukee earlier in the year, Mr Trump said: “She’s incredible. Incredible.”
The man accused of killing right-wing influencer Charlie Kirk has appeared in person at court for the first time.
Tyler Robinson, 22, from Utah, is charged with aggravated murder in relation to the shooting of Kirk on the Utah Valley University campus in Orem.
Charlie Kirk pictured in December 2024. Pic: Reuters
Video of the incident showed Kirk, 31, and a staunch ally of Donald Trump, reaching up with his right hand after a gunshot was heard as blood came out from the left side of his neck. He died shortly after.
Prosecutors plan to seek the death penalty.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
How the Charlie Kirk shooting unfolded
On Wednesday’s appearance at Fourth District Court in Provo, Utah, Robinson arrived in court with restraints on his wrists and ankles and wearing a dress shirt, tie and slacks.
Read more: What we can learn about suspect from charging document
According to the Associated Press, he smiled at family members sitting in the front row of the courtroom, where his mother teared up and wiped her eyes with a tissue.
He made previous court appearances via video or audio feed from jail.
Pic: AP
The shooting happened during Kirk’s “prove me wrong” series, which saw the father of two visit campuses and debate contentious subjects; in this case, he was discussing mass shootings.
Prosecutors say the bullet which struck Kirk’s neck “passed closely to several other individuals”, including the person questioning him as part of the event.
President Trump comforts Charlie Kirk’s widow Erika at his memorial service in Arizona in September. Pic: Reuters
A charging document about Robinson from September includes incriminating texts sent between the alleged shooter and his roommate after Kirk’s death.
Read more from Sky News:
Analysis: The real reason for Trump’s Venezuela exploits
FBI release Luigi Mangione ‘to-do list’ before alleged assassination
Judge Tony Graf also heard arguments on Wednesday about whether cameras and media should be allowed in the courtroom, with Robinson’s lawyers and the Utah County Sheriff’s Office asking for them to be banned.
Mr Kirk’s widow, Erika Kirk, has called for full transparency and said “we deserve to have cameras in there”.
The judge has already made allowances to protect Robinson’s presumption of innocence before a trial, agreeing that the case has drawn “extraordinary” public attention
US
US won’t ‘stand by and watch sanctioned vessels’, warns White House after tanker seized off Venezuela
The US will not “stand by and watch sanctioned vessels sail the seas”, the White House has warned, after American forces seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela.
Spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt told reporters she would not speak about future ship seizures, but said the US would continue to follow Donald Trump‘s sanction policies.
“We’re not going to stand by and watch sanctioned vessels sail the seas with black market oil, the proceeds of which will fuel narcoterrorism of rogue and illegitimate regimes around the world,” she said.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt briefing the media. Pic: Reuters
The US is gearing up to intercept more ships, six sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.
One source said several more sanctioned tankers had been identified by the US for potential seizure.
Two of the people said the US Justice Department and Homeland Security had been planning the seizures for months.
American forces were monitoring vessels in Venezuelan ports and waiting for them to sail into international waters before taking action, one source added.
It comes after a crude oil tanker, named Skipper, on Wednesday was stormed by US forces executing a seizure warrant.
The ship left Venezuela’s main oil port of Jose between 4 and 5 December after loading about 1.1 million barrels of oil, according to satellite information analysed by TankerTrackers.com and internal shipping data from Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA.
A still from a video of US forces seizing a Venezuelan oil tanker, posted by Pam Bondi. Pic: X/@AGPamBondi
The real reason for Donald Trump’s Venezuela exploits
Donald Trump wants you to know that there is one leading reason why he is bearing down militarily on Venezuela: drugs.
It is, he has said repeatedly, that country’s part in the production and smuggling of illegal narcotics into America that lies behind the ratcheting up of forces in the Caribbean in recent weeks. But what if there’s something else going on here too? What if this is really all about oil?
In one respect this is clearly preposterous. After all, the United States is, by a country mile, the world’s biggest oil producer. Venezuela is a comparative minnow these days, the 21st biggest producer in the world, its output having been depressed under the Chavez and then Maduro regimes. Why should America care about Venezuelan oil?
For the answer, one needs to spend a moment – strange as this will sound – contemplating the chemistry of oil…
US attorney general Pam Bondi said on X, formerly Twitter, that the ship was “used to transport sanctioned oil from Venezuela and Iran”.
“For multiple years, the oil tanker has been sanctioned by the United States due to its involvement in an illicit oil shipping network supporting foreign terrorist organisations,” she added.
Ms Leavitt said that “the United States does intend to get the oil” that was onboard the vessel.
The government in Caracas, led by President Nicolas Maduro, branded the ship’s seizure a “blatant theft” and an “act of international piracy”.
Read more:
Analysis: Is this what the beginning of a war looks like?
US-Venezuela crisis explained
Why tanker seized by US was ‘spoofing’ its location
The US has been ramping up the pressure on Mr Maduro and is reportedly considering trying to oust him. It has piled on sanctions, carried out a military build-up in the southern Caribbean, and launched attacks on suspected drug vessels from Venezuela.
Now America has issued new sanctions targeting Franqui Flores, Efrain Antonio Campo Flores, and Carlos Erik Malpica Flores – three nephews of Mr Maduro’s wife, Cilia Flores – as well as on six crude oil tankers and six shipping companies linked to them.
Skipper. Credit: TankerTrackers
By seizing oil tankers, the US is threatening Mr Maduro’s government’s main revenue source – oil exports.
The sources said the US was focusing on what’s been called the shadow fleet – tankers transporting sanctioned oil to China, the biggest buyer of crude from Venezuela and Iran.
They said one shipper had already temporarily suspended three voyages transporting six million barrels of Venezuelan crude oil.
“The cargoes were just loaded and were about to start sailing to Asia,” a source said.
“Now the voyages are cancelled and tankers are waiting off the Venezuelan coast as it’s safer to do that.”
-
Sports2 years agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports3 years agoButton battles heat exhaustion in NASCAR debut
-
Sports3 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment3 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment1 year agoHere are the best electric bikes you can buy at every price level in October 2024