Stephen Miller calls Trump GOP more popular ‘than ever’ in first CoS speech

U.S. President Donald Trump’s new White House Chief of Staff, Stephen Miller, said the Republican Party is “more popular than ever,” just days after voters handed Democrats control of the House and Senate the midterm elections.

Miller, who has replaced Susie Wiles in the administration’s staff shuffle this week, said the U.S. would “not exist right now” if it was not for the president, thanking him for “saving America” and the Republican Party.

He said Trump has made the GOP “stronger and more popular and more resilient than ever before” during his first speech as chief of staff, at Mar-a-Lago Friday night.

Less than 72 hours before, the GOP lost at least 44 House seats and seven Senate seats, as of Saturday morning.

Miller’s comments point to the mood of the administration after the party’s defeat. While Trump has acknowledged that the economy and the war in Iran contributed to the results, he has also said: “I JUST WASN’T ON THE BALLOT. IF I WERE, WE WOULD HAVE WON IN A LANDSLIDE!”

Miller’s First Speech as Chief of Staff

Miller said in his speech that it was “the privilege of a lifetime to join President Trump,” before adding: “If it wasn’t for President Trump, the United States of America would not exist right now.”

“This man saved America,” Miller said. “He saved our military from collapse, he saved our economy from destruction, he saved our border from annihilation and he saved our country from threats at home and abroad which would have been the end of the American dream forever.”

Referring to the assassination attempt against Trump, in Butler, Pennsylvania, in July 2024, and the various criminal prosecutions the president has faced, Miller said: “This man took a bullet for us, he faced down life in prison for us, he saved the Republican Party.”

“And he has made it stronger and more popular and more resilient than ever before,” Miller said. “We need to stand with the man who has stood with us and this country with ever fibre of his being.”

“I pledge to you Mr. President my absolute loyalty, my unwavering commitment and my total devotion to your success and the success of this country,” Miller said.

Miller’s New Role

This week’s staff shuffle signals that Trump is resisting a conciliatory approach to Democratic lawmakers who are eager to investigate the administration — including Miller himself as a top target.

Miller, 41, is a dogged defender of Trump and has built a deep and sophisticated understanding of a president’s executive power and how the federal government operates, portending a potential burst of executive actions in the final two years of Trump’s presidency.

He has been a fixture in Trump’s political orbit since joining his 2016 presidential campaign as a speechwriter. He has since emerged as one of the president’s most influential aides and a principal architect and public defender of the administration’s aggressive immigration agenda.

White House director of communications Steven Cheung previously told Newsweek: “Stephen Miller is a Trump OG, someone who has been with the President since the very beginning. There is no bigger advocate for the Trump agenda than Stephen, and he will help the Administration deliver on monumental victories for the rest of this historic second term.”

Trump Praises Ron DeSantis Replacement

Before the Mar-a-Lago event, Trump praised Florida’s outgoing governor Ron DeSantis, Republican U.S. Representative Byron Donalds while speaking at the Kennedy Space Center.

“He won,” Trump said. “He won it and he did it the hard way, he worked. He worked hard.”

It comes as DeSantis has been fiercely criticizing Republicans since the GOP’s defeat in the midterms, calling the results close to an “extinction-level event” for the GOP and a “rebuke” of Trump and congressional Republicans.

In a lengthy interview released on the eve of the election, he called Trump’s war with Iran a “big, big drag” on Republicans and accused Republicans of gaslighting voters about rising gas prices.

“We just got to be honest. Gas is higher. It hurts people, working class people, and it’s higher because of this conflict,” he said on Stephen A. Smith’s podcast, Straight Shooter.

“That’s just the fact. If you can’t admit that to voters, then you’re gaslighting them, and they’re not going to listen to you on other things.”

At a press conference in Tallahassee on Wednesday, he said the election results were close to an “extinction-level event” for Republicans.

DeSantis’ recent moves have fueled speculation that he is positioning himself for another run for the White House, after losing the 2024 Republican nomination to Trump.

The governor, who is term-limited and set to leave office in January, has not ruled that out.

“We’ll see what happens,” he said in an interview released on Monday. “Maybe someday. I don’t know about ’28. Maybe later. Maybe. We’ll see.”

Contact Newsweek editor on this story: Edward Pearcey.