Can Susie Wiles be to Donald Trump what her father, Pat Summerall, was to John Madden?
Summerall followed a distinguished NFL playing career with an even more distinguished career in the broadcast booth, most famously pairing with Madden, the former coach, for 22 seasons.
“Madden made for an expansive, excessive, endlessly voluble analyst, and Summerall provided his perfect play-by-play foil,” Times reporter Scott Collins wrote in an appreciation after Summerall’s death in 2013. “Precise and circumspect, with an avuncular demeanor and an authoritative voice …. Summerall indulged his partner’s many appetites and asides, even when that meant being elbowed aside at the mike and in the limelight.”
Wiles was announced as Trump’s chief of staff Thursday evening, becoming the first female chief of staff to a president in U.S. history.
During his victory celebration, Trump gave a special thanks to Wiles for her prominent role in the campaign.
“Let me also express my tremendous appreciation for Susie … on the job you did,” Trump said. “Susie likes to stay sort of in the back, let me tell you. The ice baby. We call her the ice baby. Susie likes to stay in the background. She’s not in the background.”
Wiles, 67, is one of Pat and Kathy Summerall’s three children and her father credited her with prompting him to check into the Betty Ford Clinic for treatment of his chronic alcoholism. Wiles read a letter to Summerall during an intervention in 1992: “Dad, the few times we’ve been out in public together recently, I’ve been ashamed we shared the same last name.”
In his 2006 memoir, “Summerall: On and Off the Air,” he wrote, “I hadn’t been there much for my kids, but Susan’s letter made it clear that I’d hurt them even in my absence.”
When Summerall died in 2013, Wiles described her father as “an extraordinary man and a wonderful father.” Summerall died of complications from hip surgery following two decades of sobriety. He was 82.
Wiles apparently can speak just as directly to Trump.
Trump famously does not drink after watching his brother and others succumb to alcoholism.
Wiles grew up in New Jersey, graduated from the University of Maryland and took her first job in politics as an assistant to Rep. Jack Kemp, a former NFL and AFL quarterback whose playing career overlapped that of Summerall, who was a well-regarded kicker and defensive end for three teams from 1951-61.
In 1980, Wiles joined Ronald Reagan’s 1980 presidential campaign as a campaign scheduler and cemented a career in Republican politics. In 2010, she ran Rick Scott’s successful gubernatorial campaign in Florida, and a year later she served as campaign manager for former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr.‘s presidential campaign.
Wiles also ran a lobbying firm, Ballard Partners, from 2010-19, a tenure that overlapped her first connection to Trump when she ran his 2016 campaign operations in Florida. Wiles helped Ron DeSantis’ 2018 campaign for governor of Florida, but later split with DeSantis, who convinced Trump to fire her ahead of his 2020 presidential campaign.
Nevertheless, Trump hired her in 2021 to oversee his comeback and gained an appreciation for her even-handed professionalism.
Much the way the bombastic Madden came to appreciate Summerall.
“He’s the least affected broadcaster I’ve ever known,” Madden told NFL.com. “No ego at all. I’m very outgoing and disorganized. Pat is very controlled and organized and that really helps me. His strength in tying things together makes up for my weaknesses.”
