Stephen Miller is one of the only members of the first Trump admin who has managed to stick around and make his way into a clearly influential position in the 2nd Admin. Today's press conference served as the strongest indicator yet that Miller has exerted full puppeteer-like control over Trump in my opinion. Here's my rationale:

Bukele Press Conference:

Watching today's press conference with Bukele was horrifying for many reasons. One of those was the way that Miller immediately interjected to tell Trump the Supreme Court ruled in their favor when Trump asked about the "9-0" ruling. On Friday, when asked about the ruling, Trump said:

 “If the Supreme Court said bring [Abrego-Garcia] back, I would do that. I respect the Supreme Court”

Then on the weekend Trump posted to Truth Social about the case. I could be reading too far into it, but it seems there's a decent chance this wasn't written by Trump at all. First of all, it's a bit too formal and boring for Trump these days. Little to no caps or weird punctuation.

But even more interesting, Trump doesn't really use the term 'barbarians' when he talks. But Miller's been quoted as saying "the Barbarians are at the gates" in reference to BLM protesters, and it generally seems more like a phrase someone like Miller would use.

Looking forward to seeing President Bukele, of El Salvador, on Monday! Our Nations are working closely together to eradicate terrorist organizations, and build a future of Prosperity. President Bukele has graciously accepted into his Nation's custody some of the most violent alien enemies of the World and, in particular, the United States. These barbarians are now in the sole custody of El Salvador, a proud and sovereign Nation, and their future is up to President B and his Government. They will never threaten or menace our Citizens again!

Based on his reaction during the press conference today, it seems like Trump is still relatively unaware of Abrego-Garcia's case and the way things have proceeded, including the Supreme Court's decision.

Signal Group Chat:

Then we have the Signal group chat incident. If you'll recall, in that chat there was some back and forth and lack of clarity over whether the strike had even been authorized. It was then Miller who provided the ultimate clarification:

As I heard it, the president was clear: green light, but we soon make clear to Egypt and Europe what we expect in return. We also need to figure out how to enforce such a requirement. EG, if Europe doesn’t renumerate, then what? If the US successfully restores freedom of navigation at great cost there needs to be some further economic gain extracted in return.

Covering His Ass:

Miller is often described as the true architect behind the entirety of the current Admin's immigration policy. The policies that were sold to the American people as stricter control of the border and deportation of illegal aliens.

One big problem was how much Miller oversold the problem to Trump, and Trump to the American people, the extent of the problem and the number of deportable, (or at least quickly deportable) people were currently in the US. This had led to decisions like the invocation of the Alien Enemies Act to kidnap and indefinitely detain men (and almost women) in the CECOT prison in El Salvador. If they can get away with whisking people off without any trials or court proceedings, then it becomes much easier to hit any deportation goal they want, and calling them terrorists and shipping them to a big scary prison (a modern day gulag), is one way to show the American people they're getting what they voted for.

For this strategy to fall apart, for the lack of due process and the torturous conditions being experienced by normal people rather than 'terrorists' to be fully exposed in primetime TV to the public would blow up the entirety of the admin's immigration policies and likely all blow back on Miller. Which is why my theory is that right now he's fighting for his life, pulling out all of the stops he can to try to keep Trump in the dark about the actual facts of the Abrego-Garcia case, having Bondi and the DoJ lawyers use every possible legal strategy and delay tactic to prevent the return of a single person disappeared to El Salvador.

And if he needs to cause a Constitutional Crisis to do so I'm certain he would have no qualms with that.


Previously Documented Influence:

There's also numerous articles from the first Trump admin that go into Miller's influence over Trump, all of which paint a picture of a man who has found the right way to be Trump's whisperer, a man who seems very capable of manipulating Trump, more so than anyone else in the admin.

NewYorker Article
BBC Article

Concluding:

All this to say, for all the talk of Biden's WH being run by staffers, we have far more evidence that Trump is absolutely phoning it in and Miller, at least on the immigration front, is clearly running the show.