A civil war has broken out among some of Donald Trump’s senior officials as the president looks for a scapegoat for the midterm massacre.
Multiple Republican officials and operatives believe that Trump’s trusted chief of staff, Susie Wiles, or Secretary of State Marco Rubio should be made an example of following Tuesday’s disaster, in which Democrats seized control of the House and Senate with seismic victories across the country.
Trump himself has been weighing whether to fire Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth over the deeply unpopular war in Iran, which has been cited as one of the main reasons for the GOP’s electoral wipeout.
Wiles, whom Trump has dubbed the “Ice Maiden,” has taken desperate steps to ensure she is not caught up in a potential Cabinet purge, sources told the Daily Mail. This includes playing a game of “4D chess” by pitting Rubio and Vice President JD Vance against each other while flying under the radar to avoid Trump’s wrath.
Her allies have wasted little time portraying Hegseth as the reason for Tuesday’s blue tsunami, with the deeply unpopular war in Iran causing gas prices to soar and exacerbating the financial hardships of tens of millions of Americans.
Wiles is also reported to believe Rubio must shoulder some of the blame, as he played a key role in the failed negotiations to end the war, which has dragged on for more than eight months with no end in sight.
However, sources believe Vance—who issued an extraordinary statement on Tuesday acknowledging that the Iran war had cost the GOP in the midterms—will also be dragged into the blame game, given his prominent role in the peace talks.
“It sets up a situation in which Rubio or his allies will say, well no, Mr. President, you had JD negotiate in Iran not me,” a source told the Daily Mail.
Vance and Rubio are considered the two frontrunners to succeed Trump as the 2028 Republican presidential nominee, and both will be desperate to avoid having the war hang over their own White House ambitions.
Wiles is reported to believe setting Vance and Rubio against each other will create enough chaos to ultimately benefit the president and deflect attention from her.
“Susie is looking to protect herself, but ultimately she’s also trying to protect the boss,” an official told the Daily Mail. “And that then sets up Vance and Rubio on a collision course.”
Another source added: “Shifting the blame to Hegseth, putting Rubio in the firing line, and giving JD a headache guarantees her survival post-midterm but also protects Trump’s legacy.”
As Trump’s chief of staff, Wiles would have been the architect of the administration’s midterm strategy. Sources previously told the Daily Mail that Wiles had convinced Trump Republicans would come out on top in the nationwide elections, even as the president was recording near-record-low approval ratings and polling predicted a blue wave.
Wiles has been forced to try to blame other members of Trump’s Cabinet for Tuesday’s electoral wipeout, as she cannot easily offer up White House deputy chief of staff James Blair and Trump adviser Chris LaCivita as scapegoats, the report says.
The pair, who worked at MAGA Inc., the Trump-backed super PAC, during the midterms, are Wiles appointees, so sacrificing them would also expose her.
Many believe Hegseth will not still be in his position by the time Democrats regain control of Congress in January, as Trump has been asking advisers whether he should keep his job.
Trump is said to be less furious about the war in Iran itself than about how Hegseth kept key information from the president throughout the conflict. This includes Hegseth insisting that the U.S. had destroyed all of Iran’s surface-to-air defenses and missiles during airstrikes, when that was not the case.
“The defense secretary is in charge of knowing and explaining accurately what is possible and what the relative risks are,” a source told the Daily Mail. “There is nobody else responsible for that.”
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House and the Pentagon for comment.
