The DC Swamp is right to be terrified of Trump’s new model White House

The selection of Floridians Marco Rubio, Susie Wiles, Mike Waltz and Matt Gaetz show how radical the president will be

Copy link
twitter
facebook
whatsapp
email
Copy link
twitter
facebook
whatsapp
email
“Trump begins to fill top posts with loyal defenders”, moralised the New York Times earlier this week. Announced with lightning speed on Trump’s Truth Social platform and in email messages to his close supporters, and often preceded by enticing media reports, the eminent Trumpians who will shape his second administration are largely outsiders who have pledged to support the returning president’s policies.
This is by design. Trump detests and distrusts the Washington establishment, especially its Republican adherents, whom he and his supporters often deride as “Republicans in Name Only” (RINOs). In his first administration, opponents in the Washington Swamp frustrated much of his agenda. Some joined with Democrats in his impeachment proceedings. Many others worked to prevent his return.
In the 2024 Republican primaries, most RINOs supported other candidates, especially Trump’s former UN ambassador Nikki Haley, who lasted the longest and scored one of her two primary victories in Washington, DC. Last week, she was consigned to the political wilderness in an announcement that neither she nor former secretary of state Mike Pompeo, also reportedly judged to be too close to Washington, would be invited to serve in the new administration.
It is significant that much of the new team now taking shape hails from Florida, where Trump has had a presence as owner of Palm Beach’s Mar-a-Lago estate since 1985, and where he became an official resident in 2019. That is more than enough to count as a “Florida Man”, which is a state of mind as much as it is a geographic marker in American politics today.
Now Mar-a-Lago – and Palm Beach generally – is practically a shadow White House, serving as the site where Trump’s presidential transition will be headquartered over the next 10 weeks before he is re-inaugurated in Washington.
Susan Wiles, who co-managed Trump’s presidential campaign this year, is an old hand in the state, having managed Trump’s state-level campaign in 2016, as well as Florida governor Ron DeSantis’s successful gubernatorial campaign in 2018, before returning to Trump after a fallout with DeSantis. Trump’s first major appointment was to install Wiles as White House chief of staff, a cabinet-level position that presides over the flow of personnel and information to the president and advises on issues of national importance.
Within a matter of days, Trump chose another Florida loyalist, Representative Mike Waltz, to join the Cabinet as national security advisor, the president’s senior official for international affairs. Waltz, who succeeded DeSantis in his congressional seat when the latter ran for governor in 2018, is a decorated career army officer who served as a Green Beret and remains in active service as a National Guard colonel. In 2024, he was among a number of Florida congressmen who endorsed Trump over DeSantis.
He is a firm supporter of the returning president’s tough line against China, having said “we are in a cold war with the Chinese Communist Party”. Waltz has also migrated toward Trump’s position on Ukraine, which is to encourage a negotiated peace settlement, and has voted against multiple bills to provide additional aid to Kyiv.
Importantly, both Wiles and Waltz will hold posts that are occupied at the pleasure of the president and not subject to Senate confirmation. The major cabinet office for foreign affairs, secretary of state, is subject to Senate confirmation, and it, too, will go to another Florida man, Senator Marco Rubio.
Rubio, who gained valuable experience in international affairs as a member of the Senate’s foreign relations and intelligence committees, has a contentious history with Trump, who derided him as “Little Marco” when Rubio ran against him for the 2016 presidential nomination. But eight years is an eternity in American politics and Rubio has embraced Trumpism. Also having endorsed the returning president this year, he has gravitated toward the national conservative camp and spoke at its 2022 conference in Miami.
The son of Cuban immigrants, Rubio holds a hard line against Leftist regimes in Latin America, shares the new administration’s antipathy to China, and has abandoned his early support for Ukraine in favour of Trump’s preference for a negotiated peace.
On Wednesday, Trump nominated yet another Florida loyalist, Congressman Matt Gaetz, to head the Justice Department as attorney general, specifically tasking him with combatting the weaponisation of federal law enforcement and supporting the administration’s larger project of closing the southern border.
Florida’s advance to the forefront of national politics is not unchecked, however. In a secret ballot on Wednesday, the Republican Senate Conference voted down a bid from Florida’s other senator, Rick Scott, to serve as leader of the party’s incoming majority. Scott, who is also strongly pro-Trump with solid national conservative credentials, was reportedly the favoured candidate at Mar-a-Lago and was endorsed on X by Elon Musk.
Nevertheless, the time appears to have come for Floridian solutions to American problems.
Paul du Quenoy is a historian and president of the Palm Beach Freedom Institute.
Copy link
twitter
facebook
whatsapp
email