Instructions From the White House to the Cabinet

 

By David K. Shipler

 

            The Shipler Report has obtained an internal memo from Susie Wiles, President Trump’s chief of staff, announcing a significant exception to a standing order. The reversal pertains to statements on religion.

Previously, and in multiple reminders, Wiles had warned staff and Cabinet secretaries against upstaging the president. Now, she wants them to do just that. She is known as the most candid of Trump’s inner circle, hence her direct language.

On January 21, 2025, the day after Trump’s second inauguration, she wrote: “You must not publicize yourself, take credit for successful actions, or hint that major policy initiatives originated anywhere other than the President’s fertile imagination—otherwise known as his mind. You may not make public statements more outlandish than the President’s, or that provoke either more applause or more outrage than whatever the President has ignited. He is the Force, and no one of you must ever portray yourself as more inspiring, more energizing, or more appalling than him.”

            Then, in early March of this year, Wiles issued this terse message to the Cabinet: “Kristi Noem didn’t get the memo.” Days later, Noem was fired as Secretary of Homeland Security after spending $220 million on TV ads that featured herself, decked out in a cowboy hat, riding a horse in rugged terrain like a marshal come to bring order to a turbulent land.

            Last week, after Trump trash-talked Pope Leo XIV (“WEAK on crime and terrible for Foreign Policy,”) Wiles sent this urgent memo:

 

MEMORANDUM TO CABINET MEMBERS

            April 13, 2026

 

TO: CABINET SECRETARIES

FROM: SUSIE WILES, WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF

SUBJECT: RELIGIOUS EXCEPTION TO MEMORANDA OF JAN. 21, 2025, MARCH 30, 2025, JULY 4, 2025, AND MARCH 3, 2026

 

            The White House, noting the President’s recent condemnation of the Holy Father, hereby reverses its previous order that staff and Cabinet Secretaries refrain from statements more excessive or inflammatory than the President’s. On the matter of religion, and on that topic only, Secretaries are instructed to fashion remarks that are actually more extreme, more outrageous, and more arrogant than the President’s. We acknowledge that this could present a challenge. But it is vital in maintaining the President’s (self-) image as a stable genius. Everything is relative, as we know. The Vice President, who cannot be commanded, much to the President’s dismay, is nevertheless encouraged to speak in this vein as well.

I.                    For example, it is recommended that the Vice President lecture the Holy Father on theology, notwithstanding Mr. Vance’s conversion to Catholicism just seven years ago and his lack of formal theological education. Most voters will not know this, and they will not know that Pope Leo was educated at the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago and studied Canon Law at the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas in Rome. [Vance, following the advice, then said, “I think it is very, very important for the Pope to be careful when he talks about theology.”]

II.                 Secretary of War (and Expeditions) Pete Hegseth is instructed to continue his fashioning of the Iran conflict as a holy war. His analogizing the pilot rescue on Easter to Christ rising is just the kind of statement that is valued as a way to cast the President, by comparison, in a more reasonable light—grounded, shall we say. Praying at the Secretary’s Pentagon press conferences, citing God’s blessing on our troops, and declaring His lack of mercy on the enemy are off-the-wall statements endorsed by the White House. It would also be helpful to call the Iranian Muslims “enemy infidels who are destined for hell”—again, to help the President be seen as moderate. Or to quote a fake Bible verse from a movie. [Hegseth took the advice. He quoted a mostly made-up passage from the film Pulp Fiction as if it were from Ezekiel. And he likened himself, his troops, and the administration to a healing force, with “Trump-hating” reporters as Pharisees, an ancient Jewish sect, who were “only looking for the negative” when they witnessed Jesus heal the sick. “Our press are just like these Pharisees,” Hegseth declared.]

III.              President Trump’s posting of an image of himself like Jesus, healing the sick, will be difficult to top, but it might inspire some of you to come up with another outrageous AI concoction. The purpose, again, is to make the President seem rational and cogent by comparison. A warning, however: Do not portray yourselves as God. Remember, the President does not like being relegated to inferior status, and you would undoubtedly depart soon thereafter to the Cabinet afterlife, wherever that might be.

        Good luck negotiating these treacherous waters. Please contact the office of the Chief of Staff with any questions. 

This is satire. It’s all made up (except for the quotes from Trump, Vance, and Hegseth), a disclosure made necessary by the absurdity of current reality, which prevents lots of people from telling the difference between truth and fiction.