Senator Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican, has sharply criticised President Donald Trump’s decision to replace White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles with Stephen Miller, calling Miller “the worst of all possible choices” and saying the president “needs to rethink” the move. It is the bluntest Republican break with the president since the midterm elections.
Trump announced the change on Friday, 6 November, three days after Republicans lost control of both chambers of Congress in the midterm elections. Miller, the current deputy chief of staff, will become chief of staff on Monday, 9 November, and Wiles will move to the “Trump Political Operation”. Wiles was the first woman to serve as White House chief of staff and Trump’s longest-serving chief of staff.
Tillis’s criticism matters because it comes from inside the president’s own party, and from a senator who has often been willing to break with Trump. His intervention signals that the appointment, announced as a show of strength after a bruising election, is instead deepening divisions among Republicans about how the White House should deal with the incoming Democratic majorities.
Who Miller is — and why he alarms critics
Miller, a Trump loyalist and longtime political adviser, is the shaper of the president’s immigration policies and one of his most hardline aides on immigration enforcement. He has been with Trump since the start of his political career and is regarded as one of his most trusted advisers. Critics, including Democrats, describe him as the architect of the administration’s most controversial policies, from mass deportations to the curtailing of legal immigration routes.
Democratic reaction was swift. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries called for Miller to be fired, and Representative Robert Garcia, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, said Democrats would investigate Miller and that he “should lawyer up”. The White House separately confirmed Miller’s appointment as the 33rd chief of staff and released endorsements from Cabinet members, Republican lawmakers and conservative allies.
A test of the new Congress
Miller formally assumes the role on Monday, and his early staffing and outreach decisions will signal how the White House intends to deal with the incoming Democratic majorities. Wiles submitted her resignation on Thursday night, 5 November. Trump said she had done “an outstanding job” and praised Miller, saying: “Stephen’s been with me from beginning. He gets it.”
The appointment comes as the administration faces its most difficult period since Trump returned to office. Democrats have won 254 House seats and at least 54 Senate seats, and the new Congress will be sworn in on 3 January 2027. Whether Miller can manage a White House that must now negotiate with, rather than ignore, a Democratic Congress is the question Tillis’s criticism puts at the centre of the week.
