How Susie Wiles Shaped American Politics, The Untold Story with Michael Kruse

[00:00:01] Mikes on Mic a conversation about politics, government and Jacksonville. With

[00:00:09] 50 year opinion leaders Mike Hightower, Mike Tolbert an award winning broadcaster

[00:00:15] and longtime political observer Mike Miller. Welcome to another edition of

[00:00:19] Mikes on Mic I'm Mike Miller with my colleagues Mike Tolbert and Mike Hightower

[00:00:23] and as always we start the program with gratitude to Alan Bliss and the

[00:00:29] the fine folks at the Jacksonville Historical Society located in the Jacksonville History

[00:00:34] Center. This essential organization helps the people of Jacksonville preserve and share

[00:00:40] this big, complicated city's many fascinating stories. Learn more at jackshistory.org.

[00:00:46] Thank you for your support of Mike's on Mike.

[00:00:49] Lesson a month ago, Political Magazine published a lengthy, in-depth article about Jacksonville's

[00:00:53] Susie Wiles, currently at the side of Republican presidential nominee or presumptive nominee

[00:00:59] and former president Donald Trump. The article is entitled the most feared and least known

[00:01:04] political operative in America. Our guest today wrote, Wiles is not just one of Trump's

[00:01:10] senior advisors, she's the most important advisor. She's been in essence the chief

[00:01:15] of staff for the last three years. Michael Cruz is a senior staff writer at Politico

[00:01:20] and Political Magazine. He's also a multi-award winning journalist who's been recognized for

[00:01:25] his coverage of President Donald Trump and Congress. He's currently writing a book on

[00:01:30] the infamous Hanging Chads 2000 presidential election. I can't wait for that one. Michael

[00:01:36] lives in North Carolina with his wife, two daughters, three dogs, a cat and a fish.

[00:01:41] There you go. I was going to ask him if he knew all their names but I'll wait

[00:01:44] for that on that. Michael, welcome to Mike's on Mike. As a matter of transparency

[00:01:48] must say this, all three of us, Mike's were quoted in the article.

[00:01:52] Michael Cruz, thank you for coming and joining us today. It's all the way from North Carolina.

[00:01:57] The three of us know Susie Wiles. We've worked with her, Mike Hightower and I have also

[00:02:04] worked against her. She's in Jacksonville. She's worked and advised Congressman and

[00:02:09] until-hand founder, Mayor John D'Lan and Mayor Pagan and a host of other Republicans.

[00:02:15] But Michael Nessian, we used wine, sursey, wilds. What caused you to have your attention and your

[00:02:22] talk, Mr. Schleuzel-Riles, for this hell of a story? Thank you for having me. The short answer

[00:02:30] to that question is she's the right combination of interesting and important right now.

[00:02:37] She is very, very important. She is, as you mentioned and as I wrote in the piece,

[00:02:42] the most important advisor to arguably the most important political figure of our time, certainly

[00:02:48] the most consequential political figure of our time. And so that by definition makes her

[00:02:54] extremely important. I think more broadly she has such a long arc in her political life

[00:03:02] that is worth exploring on its own. She started working in politics in the late 70s. So if

[00:03:08] you're trying to understand how we, how the Republican Party has gone from

[00:03:16] Reaganism to Trumpism, her own experience, her own story arc is a lens through which to

[00:03:26] think about that and learn about that. And so it was no brainer. I mean really, this is

[00:03:33] something I could have done maybe should have done even earlier.

[00:03:37] Well you did make an amendment story and there's no question of like that. I would honk

[00:03:42] the sheet strings of what you wrote. Tell me how long did it take you to write this article?

[00:03:47] It was pretty damn long. How many people did you interview? And I'm curious to know that people,

[00:03:52] the people waiting to talk to you on the record, they say glowing things about Suzy but

[00:03:59] wouldn't say you didn't end the record, didn't that be critical?

[00:04:03] I ended up talking to north of 100 people for this piece. I told probably a couple dozen of those

[00:04:13] folks I talked to three, four, five times just kept going back. Here's what I've learned. I've

[00:04:19] learned a little bit more. Here's how I'm thinking bouncing ideas off of the people

[00:04:24] within those hundred people who were particularly helpful to me in trying to unpack and understand

[00:04:32] Suzy and what makes her tick. All told that probably took me a couple months, two and a half

[00:04:41] months or so and then over the last several weeks is when I really started to try to pull it together.

[00:04:49] Think about how I needed to structure this. What is the shape of this piece? Certainly it was a

[00:04:55] unusually frustrating at times reporting this story just given the amount of people who

[00:05:00] had lots of interesting thoughts about Suzy, lots of interesting things to say but

[00:05:06] for in many cases understandable reasons did not want to have their names attached to those thoughts

[00:05:11] but the balance of those conversations on the record off the record background

[00:05:19] all added up to my understanding and my sort of theory of the case toward the end of the

[00:05:24] process that I'm able to prosecute in the piece. Listen Michael it's just the four of us

[00:05:30] so why don't you just go ahead and let us know who are those people that you want to talk to.

[00:05:33] We won't tell anybody. We won't. You can whisper it into your microphone,

[00:05:37] you won't go any further than just the four of us. It's just the three mics. Scouts on it.

[00:05:43] Those are I don't even share those things with my wife so.

[00:05:48] Catter the fish. Not here. Now with her and now with even the esteemed three mics on

[00:05:54] on mics on Mike. Welcome to three mics and appreciate you being here and for the record

[00:06:03] as you already know I'm a 40 year friend and supporter of Suzy Wilde so let's just for the

[00:06:08] record go ahead and put that there and there was no put yes you know there why don't you say all

[00:06:12] those bad things in the article? Well because I was talking to this guy. Anyway Mike it's not

[00:06:19] unusual for political consultants to seek the spotlight as we know you're looking at three of

[00:06:25] them. Apparently Suzy Wilde's is not one of them. Lust the title of your article why those in Jacksonville

[00:06:35] or across Florida know Suzy has been an incredible successful political influencer at high levels

[00:06:41] for decades. We all know that however it's like she sneaked up on the rest of America

[00:06:47] but for some reason things often don't work out for her. She is credited with both Rick Scott

[00:06:55] and Ron DeSantis come from behind winning campaigns to become both of them Florida's governor

[00:07:02] as well as Trump's 2016 win to become president by her successfully coordinating the November

[00:07:10] campaign in both Florida and Iowa. Many people to this day say DeSantis would not have become governor

[00:07:18] if it had not been for Suzy Wilde's. I'm one of them but then things went off the rails

[00:07:24] with all three of these men. Then DeSantis in a very mean spirited petty and very cruel manner

[00:07:32] fired her from his staff, the state republican party and then pressure telehassie consultant

[00:07:38] Brian Ballard to fire her as her primary DC consultant and then told Trump he should get rid

[00:07:44] of her because she was a bad person. To make matters worse DeSantis did this in the most public

[00:07:51] humiliating manner possible. DeSantis did his best to make her politically radioactive. We

[00:07:58] then threatened her professional reputation and her personal livelihood. Mike you wrote that

[00:08:04] she told you it was so traumatic for me. I feared for everything my reputation, my livelihood,

[00:08:13] my ability to have a livelihood. Mike walk us through all of that and that conversation you had

[00:08:20] with her. So as I think everybody who follows politics even a little bit in Florida and beyond

[00:08:27] at this point knows she was riding high coming out of the 2018 gubernatorial cycle

[00:08:34] because she had come in fairly late, really late in that election cycle helped Ron DeSantis beat Andrew

[00:08:45] Gillum by a very small margin just got him across the finish line. She got and deserved a lot of

[00:08:53] that credit. There were a variety of reasons that are outlined in the story and to some

[00:08:59] extent are still somewhat murky and not agreed upon shall we say by the various combatants.

[00:09:07] Things fell apart in DeSantis land in Tallahassee for not just Susie but a lot of young up and

[00:09:15] coming politicos who affiliate themselves with and feel very loyal to Susie for a host of reasons

[00:09:26] and so when the then quite ascended Governor Ron DeSantis not only got rid of her but as you

[00:09:36] remind us made it quite public and tried to make it hurt in ways that a lot of people

[00:09:42] not even Susie friends necessarily felt disproportionate if nothing else. She was

[00:09:49] questioning and before I heard it from her I heard it certainly from people around her

[00:09:54] people who had had conversations with her at that time in late 19 and into early 2020 she was

[00:09:59] questioning whether or not she could bounce back from this. I mean one of the things that has

[00:10:03] been a hallmark of her career among other things on this list is her ability to survive to spin out

[00:10:09] of situations that would stall or even kill other careers within politics. This seemed like

[00:10:19] potentially a fatal setback for politically speaking. Not only was she on the outs with the then

[00:10:30] very powerful governor of Florida, the man thought to be at the time the favorite to be the 2024

[00:10:37] Republican presidential nominee but because of that not unrelated to that

[00:10:41] Donald Trump himself and Brian Ballard to varying degrees and for varying amounts of time also

[00:10:52] distance themselves from Susie. What Susie had working for her though was I think in some sense

[00:10:59] the fruits of her long career in politics the way she has developed networks. Long lists of

[00:11:07] people who feel not just affinity for her but great loyalty toward her or her and I think prove

[00:11:16] harder than Governor DeSantis and his allies perhaps thought it would be to snuff her out so

[00:11:25] to speak. You need help, you need other people to not give her a second chance. Ultimately of

[00:11:31] course the person who gave her her next chance the biggest next chance was Donald Trump himself

[00:11:37] who at some point just decided I need to win Florida more than I need to continue to placate

[00:11:42] Ron DeSantis by that time of course I think it wasn't just a Susie thing it was a Donald Trump

[00:11:48] thing too who saw that Ron DeSantis was going to run against him which he clearly perceived to be

[00:11:57] active disloyalty if not outright betrayal. So he his incentives are starting to change

[00:12:03] there too invites Susie back into the fold to run his 2020 efforts in the state of Florida she did so

[00:12:10] she did successfully. The only swing state Florida at that time was considered a swing

[00:12:17] state the only swing state that he won in that election in which he lost and so that

[00:12:23] rekindled that relationship that he had had with Susie for years before that and that

[00:12:30] led to steadily her role now. Shortly after January 6th she is back running his post

[00:12:40] presidential political operation out of Mar-a-Lago out of her house in Pantabitia and that one

[00:12:48] thing led to another and here she is is de facto campaign manager as de facto chief of staff

[00:12:53] the most important most influential advisor to the man who might be president again.

[00:13:00] What do you what do you think her role has been because I understand that she's

[00:13:05] very active in helping President Trump find a running mate for 24 and she's from what I

[00:13:13] understand leading that effort what is she going to be able to bring to that what is she looking

[00:13:18] what do you think she's looking for in order to recommend to the former president that this is a

[00:13:24] person that you really should strongly consider for this position. I mean I should say at the outset

[00:13:31] I don't I'm not currently reporting on those efforts so I only know what I know and I

[00:13:38] certainly don't know what I don't know I think generally speaking she has been quite adept

[00:13:45] more adept at literally anybody else since in my estimation since Donald Trump came down the escalator

[00:13:52] to announce his first presidential run at managing him without managing him by which I mean guiding

[00:14:00] him but guiding him in a way that he doesn't feel like she's telling him what to do.

[00:14:06] I can't overstate how clear-eyed she is about the fact that he will do ultimately what he will do.

[00:14:16] You wrote that she tried to make herself indispensable like just about every other political

[00:14:22] consultant I've ever known and you also wrote that you were told by some people that Susie has

[00:14:26] a need to be needed tell us about that. This need to be needed

[00:14:33] has manifested itself in the estimation of many who've known her and watched her in

[00:14:40] a particular way she goes about serving trying to serve trying to be a very important cog in

[00:14:47] somebody's political operation to be the most important person to the most important person

[00:14:53] right is one way another person I talked to put it so whether that is John Delaney or John Payton

[00:15:01] in Jacksonville or Rick Scott running in 2010 to be governor or Donald Trump now the idea

[00:15:11] is to put herself in that position. Now she does not necessarily see it this way she wants to be

[00:15:19] certainly important she wants to be a help but the idea that there's this sort of pathological

[00:15:28] need to be needed I don't know that she would go that far but the pattern of behavior is there

[00:15:34] and certainly people around her many many people around her at various stages along the way

[00:15:40] have identified this as something that makes her stick out even in the context of a profession

[00:15:46] which as you say there are many people who want to be of close to power approximated power be

[00:15:51] important to the important person. You know Michael when I was publishing inside Siddhors

[00:15:57] and John Grun was wearing Simzine was at his side she was a really good source for me

[00:16:05] and I don't know what you learned about her use of information including Winks is a way to

[00:16:12] help power tell us how she she may start fires at the end and put them out or let them burn.

[00:16:21] This is another way in which the story was a real challenge was both fascinating but also frustrating

[00:16:28] how to describe how somebody uses information how somebody leverages information sort of a

[00:16:34] hard thing to do it was a hard thing for people to describe to me it was in some cases a hard

[00:16:39] thing for me to describe to my reader but okay one it's something a lot of people do not just in

[00:16:45] politics the leveraging of information the leveraging of relationships this describes at least a soft

[00:16:51] power portion of a lot of professions right but in politics and in the world of Susie Wiles

[00:16:59] what I heard from many people across years and decades and different principles and

[00:17:06] administrations and campaigns that she is very easy to talk to she's a I mean as you all know she is a

[00:17:17] an affable interesting conversationalist uh that leads naturally to the exchange of information

[00:17:27] Susie tells things to people people tell things to Susie so now Susie knows these things

[00:17:32] and pieces of information can be used even after the course of many many years to advance

[00:17:43] certain goals or aims both good and and bad and this is something in the estimation of many

[00:17:51] that she is really really good at you know Michael in the early stages of that race I had

[00:17:57] dinner with Mira Peyton one night and he he he observed that that the Santas would really day

[00:18:05] that he fired Susie Wiles and did what he did and I think he just told us that she

[00:18:12] John Peyton was correct right and so you know it's so interesting because

[00:18:19] in the course of my reporting people around Susie now people who used to work for or within

[00:18:28] the administration of Rhonda Santas now work around for Susie Wiles and Donald Trump

[00:18:36] those are people who will say yeah yeah I did you Susie didn't do this Susie didn't do that

[00:18:44] didn't do this Susie didn't do that she didn't tell us to do this or tell me to do that but

[00:18:49] the point is like she doesn't have to she did it's it it sometimes wants you're indirect than

[00:18:54] that her influence or understanding they're sort of the mind meld uh the just sort of the

[00:19:00] the ambient knowledge of what to do and roughly how uh is a is a is a is a pattern is an m o is

[00:19:09] a thing that people who've been around Susie have come to understand have come to recognize and so

[00:19:15] when certain things start to happen over the course of that 12th plus months in which

[00:19:21] the the trajectories of Rhonda Santas and Donald Trump almost are inverted right you have

[00:19:28] Donald Trump listing a little bit uh coming out of the 2022 midterms and Rhonda Santas

[00:19:35] is getting ready to for take off and and yet here we are here we are where uh Ron Bassett

[00:19:46] is back in Tallahassee looking his wounds and Donald Trump while he has many challenges right now

[00:19:54] legal and otherwise very well could be elected president again and that is not unrelated to

[00:20:02] the ways of Susie Wiles say many many who are familiar with those ways yeah uh picking up on

[00:20:10] what Mike Talbert and uh John Peyton said you know there's an old political adage which Mike

[00:20:17] Talbert and I've been doing this now 50 some odd years you know uh be careful you know if

[00:20:23] you're gonna nothing worse than a wounded king and you said the loyalty and I will tell you

[00:20:30] I'm one of those people but there's a lot of people out there there's an old political adage

[00:20:34] says all tracks around and paybacks are held and the fact that is it was so public and so humiliating

[00:20:42] when it didn't have to be but he did you know in the article Mike you indicated uh as you

[00:20:47] interviewed people uh many had what many had what you called earnest inquiries of you

[00:20:55] of you why is she working for him and why does it seem it's working so well so as you were interviewed

[00:21:02] and I think you've got the idea you are being interviewed so uh how'd you respond to that

[00:21:10] I mean my response to those questions was well let me try to figure it out um you know

[00:21:17] in some ways that's where I want to be um as a reporter certainly at a certain stage of

[00:21:24] the process of putting together a piece like this I don't I don't want it to be me asking questions and

[00:21:32] receiving answers I want it to be much more of a conversation I want it to be sort of a

[00:21:37] almost a group effort to try to get to an answer and then some uh points along the way I want

[00:21:44] it to be a group effort to even get the questions like what are what are what is actually a hand

[00:21:49] here what are the questions first before I even try to answer those questions and so this in

[00:21:55] in this very direct way uh was an extreme version of a thing I uh experience almost

[00:22:02] with every story I do where in the course of my reporting efforts um I'm hearing

[00:22:10] questions from other people that then I need to go out and try to answer because if

[00:22:17] even people who know her if even people who know politics and know Florida politics really really well

[00:22:25] and not just republicans democrats too in some conversations I had even more so with democrats

[00:22:30] you know a sense of of awe at what she's been able to do particularly in the last decade plus but

[00:22:37] over the course of uh four decades of a life in politics how did she do this how does what is

[00:22:43] about her I don't you know democrats who've lost races to her who've watched them afar uh you know

[00:22:50] what is it about her that that you know makes her um do this and what makes um the way she is works

[00:22:57] so well or to this point works so well with the guy who has been famously hard to get along with

[00:23:02] when you're uh in that seat of of being the most important or a most important advisor

[00:23:10] my father used to have a comment you a question he would always ask me when I was getting in trouble

[00:23:16] and he said what makes you tick uh you could almost write a book called what makes Susie

[00:23:22] Wiles tick at the risk of gross over a generalization that is the very broad question

[00:23:30] that I enter every story with what makes this person tick most cliche but you know seriously why

[00:23:40] is somebody doing what they're doing how does somebody do it well uh you know this is this is not a

[00:23:46] question of politics it's a question of of people um and I the way I envision my job at this point

[00:23:53] I've been at politico for nine and a half years now which is hard to believe but it I need I

[00:23:57] need to understand the politics and I need to hopefully understand the politics in some

[00:24:00] sophisticated way because I do after a work for a place called politico but more than even that

[00:24:06] I want to write about the people who do politics who are involved in politics why what are they

[00:24:12] doing why are they doing it I mean this is that is the goal of of profile work of that

[00:24:18] genre of journalism so trying to marry sort of uh the understanding of politics

[00:24:24] readers of politico obviously are more interested in politics and policy than maybe the average

[00:24:30] general interest reader but all sorts of readers millions of people who come to politico and I

[00:24:36] at least aim on my best days to serve both that that deep interest in politics but also just

[00:24:45] a more universal interest in our fellow human beings what do they do and why you interviewed

[00:24:53] her at starbucks in palm beach which is close to morrillago um was it hard to get her to talk to you

[00:24:59] I mean did you have to try to convince her to do sit down and talk or was she welcoming this

[00:25:05] how did that come about welcoming is not a word I choose um let me see it's a little

[00:25:13] not a little it is unusual for her to have engaged in this kind of peace in this way

[00:25:18] um there have been previous efforts to profile um her uh then new york times did one year and a half

[00:25:30] or a couple years ago she did not talk to them for that at least not on the record cnn in 2022

[00:25:37] same thing uh there was one in nbcnews.com not too long ago earlier this year I want to say

[00:25:47] and she did have some comments on the record there although they mostly were in praise of

[00:25:53] the man for whom she works um so I think it is fair to say that she had not at least in this

[00:25:59] political context in her current context she had not talked on the record in this way about

[00:26:06] these things in particular uh her backstory with her father pat summer all with his struggles with

[00:26:14] alcohol abuse um and how that affected her you know that that michael that one of the most

[00:26:20] interesting thing to me about the article is is how she talked about the influence and

[00:26:25] impact of her appearance like you said especially her dad pat sunroal uh telling me tell us think

[00:26:34] us inside that conversation well with susie how did she describe the impact for dad and on her

[00:26:41] and her mother as well but especially no dad certainly she was responding to in our conversations to

[00:26:50] this was my questions about that that were themselves response a response to my reporting

[00:26:57] with lots of others and my reading I know the first thing I did for this piece basically was read

[00:27:02] um pat summer all's memoir in which he is very upfront with uh about the ways he

[00:27:12] struggled and was absent as a father and regretted it deeply and tried to make up for it

[00:27:20] in the latter decades of his life when he became sober I mean he pat summer all is the one who

[00:27:26] should have put this first uh in the public record and so anybody who's willing to you know buy off

[00:27:35] amazon use pat summer all's memoir um has the beginning of an understanding of what it was like

[00:27:44] to be young susie summer all uh my cruise thank you unbelievable just I don't I think I now

[00:27:52] understand why you are an award-winning journalist I don't think I've ever heard anybody

[00:27:58] have this it's extraordinary thank you one last question what are your three takeaways of doing

[00:28:07] this article with Susie wiles uh you know people are people are complicated um

[00:28:15] people are complicated uh and I don't say that in a bad way people are complicated that's

[00:28:20] that's to say they're that they're interesting and she is um she's uh quite interesting and

[00:28:27] and quite complicated I mean I think the other thing I don't know I don't know about three takeaways

[00:28:34] but I mean yeah people are going to also see what they want to see um is one reason I hesitate to

[00:28:46] list takeaways is that I want those takeaways to be takeaways that the readers themselves get to

[00:28:55] if you read this story there are many many people who will see her as an enabler to somebody who

[00:29:07] just should not be president again who maybe shouldn't have been presidents at all

[00:29:12] and then there are people who read this story and think she's uniquely equipped to

[00:29:19] help this person who might be president again it is uh the feedback I've gotten since it ran

[00:29:27] just runs the gamut and that's that's not out of the ordinary actually just because of

[00:29:35] how sort of split we are politically people read the same thing in totally different ways

[00:29:41] but this may be in particular there is a there's something about her and her current role that

[00:29:49] made readers see this story as everything from uh a hit piece to a to a fluff piece um you know

[00:30:00] to a beat sweetener and that's fine you know what it tells me is that uh that I found some

[00:30:05] uh some useful and illuminating middle ground you know she can't quite be pegged in simple

[00:30:16] uh but yeah purely partisan ways and what I guess I hope the takeaway would be

[00:30:24] uh is that readers would come away from that story thinking of her a little bit more as a

[00:30:33] as a full as a full person as we all are right rather than simply uh a uh an enabler or a helper

[00:30:44] you know a political advisor who's great or awful you know she is as we all are you know

[00:30:50] a mixture of things for a mixture of reasons and so I would hope the takeaway um is a little bit

[00:30:56] more nuanced than we sometimes see in the current uh political and politics adjacent discourse you

[00:31:02] know you have a lot of quotes in this article from people like Ron Littlepage, John Payton,

[00:31:07] Democrats, and Tallahassee who worked for her and worked against her but uh one quote that I

[00:31:13] wanted to end the show with actually comes from this gentleman on the right which I think sums

[00:31:18] it up more than any other quote that I read Mike Hightower wrote she's like fog you know

[00:31:25] it's there but you can't get your hands around it and boy that sure does wrap it up Mr. Hightower

[00:31:32] thank you very very much next week we are approaching the 44th year of the Jacksonville

[00:31:38] Jazz Festival over Memorial Day weekend so we're going to go back in time with my other

[00:31:43] Mike friend Mr. Tolbert who organized the first jazz festival back in those days never knew

[00:31:49] that he was only 10 at the time I'm sorry miss he was 50 at the time I'm sorry there's a misprint

[00:31:56] on that anyhow we're going to have some terrific stories that you're going to be hearing about the

[00:32:00] old days of the jazz festival and it's our way of paying tribute to one of the best one of the

[00:32:06] best events that this city throws every single year so we hope you'll join us for that again

[00:32:11] our thanks to Michael Cruz our thanks to the Jacksonville Historical Society and the Jacksonville

[00:32:15] History Center for their continued support of this podcast we'll see you all again next week thanks for

[00:32:20] joining us Mike's on Mike with Mike Tolbert Mike Hightower and Mike Miller can be found on your

[00:32:27] favorite podcasting platform Facebook and YouTube visit the website at Mike's on Mike.com join us

[00:32:34] next time for more conversation with Mike's on Mike Mike