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Trump’s chief of staff can’t sway a media that revels in Republican ridicule
New York Post ^ | Dec. 17, 2025, 6:43 p.m. ET | Ben Domenech

Posted on 12/17/2025 4:57:45 PM PST by E. Pluribus Unum

Oops, they did it again.

The White House decision to cooperate with Vanity Fair, giving the magazine exclusive access to top Trump administration figures, is one more example of what happens when you let the legacy media pretend that this time, it’s changed. 

That its editors won’t screw you over, its reporters won’t put the worst possible spin on your remarks, its photographers won’t dream of using Photoshop to highlight your every blemish for social-media snipers to spread far and wide.

Why, oh why, does every Republican administration fall in love with the idea of trying to win over the people who hate them?

Beware of writers who act like you’re a friend.

Unless I’ve bailed you out and didn’t write about it, I assure you, we are not.

I admit that looks can be deceiving.

But nothing is more deceptive than Vanity Fair’s depiction of members of this administration in bizarre close-ups deliberately staged and selected to make them look ugly — spotlighting splotches, scars and crazy eyes.

In the past, legacy media at least had some shame about this.

When The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg profiled John McCain in 2008, the photographer hired for the piece used lighting and strobes in a purposefully deceptive way.

As The Post reported at the time, the photographer “crowed that she had tricked McCain into standing over a strobe light placed on the floor — turning the septuagenarian’s face into a horror show of shadows . . . The resulting photos depict McCain as devilish, with bulging brows and washed-out skin.”

“‘He had no idea he was being lit from below,’ [the photographer] said, adding that none of his entourage picked up on the light switch either. ‘I guess they’re not very sophisticated.’”

Goldberg and James Bennet, The Atlantic’s editor at the time, both publicly apologized — calling the...

(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...


TOPICS: Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: enemedia; media; mediabias; msm; wiles

1 posted on 12/17/2025 4:57:45 PM PST by E. Pluribus Unum
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

Whatever happened to the concept of loyalty? You dance with the one that brung you.


2 posted on 12/17/2025 5:00:44 PM PST by laconic
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

She granted Vanity Fair unlimited access? What did she expect?!


3 posted on 12/17/2025 5:00:51 PM PST by Rummyfan (Ok In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support lthe civilized man.👨 so t tv)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

Can we drain the Atlantic and make the Euroweenies freeze?


4 posted on 12/17/2025 5:03:54 PM PST by Paladin2 (YMMV)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

Chiefs of Staff during the first Trump administration:

Reince Priebus
John Kelly
Mick Mulvaney
Mark Meadows

Chief of Staff during the second Trump administration:

Suzie Wiles

Seems to average one per year.


5 posted on 12/17/2025 5:09:26 PM PST by Mr. N. Wolfe
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

I honestly don’t know why they do not have their own crew filming the whole conversation so they can show how the media twist words - would be fun - play the twist then play the actual words said!


6 posted on 12/17/2025 5:11:31 PM PST by blueyon (God, is who we need)
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To: blueyon
I honestly don’t know why they do not have their own crew filming the whole conversation so they can show how the media twist words - would be fun - play the twist then play the actual words said!

Katie Couric was going to interview with Alex Jones once, but backed out when Jones insisted on having his own videographer there too.

7 posted on 12/17/2025 5:15:04 PM PST by E. Pluribus Unum (I have nro answers. Only questions.)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

I seriously doubt that Susie Wiles did this without the President’s knowledge and wink/nod.

If I were Vought, Vance or Biondi, I would be a little nervous right now since she had some not very flattering things to say about all of them.


8 posted on 12/17/2025 5:28:45 PM PST by XRdsRev (Justice for Bernell Trammell, black Trump supporter, executed in the street in broad daylight 2020.a)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

I PREDICT NO MIRE ‘IN DEPTH” INTERVIEWS.


9 posted on 12/17/2025 5:38:30 PM PST by ridesthemiles (not giving up on TRUMP---EVER)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

I PREDICT NO MORE ‘IN DEPTH” INTERVIEWS.


10 posted on 12/17/2025 5:38:38 PM PST by ridesthemiles (not giving up on TRUMP---EVER)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

If I recall, this RINO author Domenech was about as pro-Trump as the Rich Lowry brigades over at National Review. Which was even more vociferously anti-Trump than Vanity Fair. So keep hold of your tampon, Pete.

Trump needs no advice from dirtbags like you on how to handle the media. Afterall, he beat you and the other never-Trumper RINO media types like an ugly, red-headed stepchild.


11 posted on 12/17/2025 5:42:33 PM PST by pissant ((Deport 'em all))
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To: Mr. N. Wolfe

“Chief of Staff during the second Trump administration:
Suzie Wiles
Seems to average one per year.”

Bitch needs to go if she doesn’t understand something as BASIC as keeping the RABID media at arm’s distance.


12 posted on 12/17/2025 5:59:39 PM PST by BobL (Trusting one's doctor is the #1 health mistake one can make.)
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To: blueyon

Why go there in the fitst place. Do they think they’re goinh to sway anyone from the other side?


13 posted on 12/17/2025 6:02:26 PM PST by aquila48 (Do not let them make you "care" ! Guilting you is how they control you. )
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To: aquila48

This is the question of the day. Nobody at VF and not one of their few readers will stop hating Trump because Wiles was a cooperative patsy for them. What could her real motive possibly have been?


14 posted on 12/17/2025 6:55:32 PM PST by hinckley buzzard ( Resist the narrative. )
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

Mad Magazine is waiting.


15 posted on 12/17/2025 6:59:37 PM PST by Mark (DONATE ONCE every 3 months-is that a big deal?)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

Had the White House been smart, they would have required Vanity Fair to publish a spread on Trump’s wife before giving them this interview.


16 posted on 12/17/2025 8:19:23 PM PST by aimhigh (1 John 3:23 "And THIS is His commandment . . . . ")
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To: blueyon

Said that to my wife. Set up. Trump then shows the evidence and sues for $10 billion.


17 posted on 12/17/2025 8:23:08 PM PST by Fledermaus ("It turns out all we really needed was a new President!")
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

The hate for MAGA and Republicans is so deep, they will never change their tactics.


18 posted on 12/18/2025 4:57:36 AM PST by FreedBird (E)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

Trumps COS is a POS.


19 posted on 12/18/2025 4:12:30 PM PST by Glad2bnuts
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