反思从来不是唐纳德·特朗普的显著特质之一。他从不接受指责或纠正方向；他只会成为一个更纯粹的自己。
Introspection has never been one of Donald Trump’s more notable attributes. He never accepts blame or course-corrects; he only becomes a more distilled version of himself.
因此，面对压倒性的选票拒绝，总统用史蒂芬·米勒取代了他的幕僚长苏西·威尔斯。
And so, faced with rejection at the ballot box on an overwhelming scale, the president responded by replacing his chief of staff, Susie Wiles, with Stephen Miller.
严格来说，米勒曾是威尔斯的副手，担任副幕僚长。实际上，米勒已经是政府中最有权势的人物，甚至可能包括特朗普本人。特朗普的前顾问、米勒的盟友史蒂夫·班农，在特朗普第一任期内曾一度被视为幕后操纵者，他今年早些时候对我的同事们形容米勒是特朗普的“首相”。在议会制下，总统或君主仅仅是象征性的国家元首，而首相是政府首脑。
Technically speaking, Miller had been Wiles’s second in command, as deputy chief of staff. In reality, Miller was already the administration’s most powerful figure, arguably including Trump himself. Steve Bannon, a former Trump adviser and a Miller ally who was briefly cast as the power behind the throne during Trump’s first term, described Miller to my colleagues earlier this year as Trump’s “prime minister.”In a parliamentary system, the president or monarch is merely the symbolic head of state, while the prime minister is the head of government.
威尔斯虽然以其专业和能力著称，但她通过迎合特朗普的冲动而不加质疑地维持了近两年的职位。然而，米勒却驱动并塑造了这些冲动。
Wiles, while reputed for her professionalism and competence, held her job for nearly two years by facilitating Trump’s impulses without questioning them. Miller, however, has driven and shaped those impulses.
他是一个狂热的后自由主义者。米勒一再将反对派描述为非法。“民主党不是一个政党，”他去年说。“它是一个国内极端组织。”他痴迷且有效地利用行政命令来绕过国会这个立法机构。即使在他有盟友控制国会时，特朗普对立法机构的利用也很少。如果米勒一如既往，他将扩大对行政命令的依赖，并使政府完全无视任何监督。
He is fanatically post-liberal. Miller has repeatedly described the opposition as illegitimate. “The Democrat Party is not a political party,” he said last year. “It is a domestic extremist organization.”He has obsessively, and effectively, employed executive actions to circumvent Congress as a lawmaking body. Trump had little use for the legislature even when his allies controlled it. If Miller remains true to form, he will extend his reliance on executive action, and commit the administration to total defiance of any oversight.
他之所以格外执着，是因为他深信移民是左翼精英策划的一场阴谋，旨在摧毁传统的美国。米勒比任何其他单一因素都更能解释特朗普令人费解的选择——炸毁他那支在2024年大选中取得惊人成果、并在拉美裔选民中实现显著突破的联盟。他主导了政府这场疯狂的大规模驱逐行动，其行动信念是：共和党只有四年时间来永久重塑美国的人口结构，否则将面临永久灭绝。
He is especially driven by his belief that immigration is a plot directed by left-wing elites to destroy traditional America. Miller, more than any other single factor, explains Trump’s baffling choice to blow up his 2024 coalition, which registered shocking gains among Latinos. He has directed the administration’s frantic campaign of mass deportation, acting in the belief that the GOP has four years to permanently reshape American demography or face permanent extinction.
米勒比任何其他人都更应对美国街头释放出的暴力混乱负责，蒙面特工乘坐无标识车辆四处抓捕嫌疑人。他还实际上关闭了合法移民大门——白人南非人除外，政府对他们高调表示欢迎。据《纽约时报》报道，甚至特朗普有时也会抱怨米勒的移民执法行动走得太远。
Miller, more than any other person, is responsible for unleashing violent havoc on American streets, as masked agents in unmarked vehicles have swept up suspects. He has also virtually shut down legal immigration—except for white South Africans, whom the administration has ostentatiously welcomed. Even Trump, according to the , has sometimes complained that Miller’s immigration enforcement has gone too far.
米勒的执法方案显然不是导致特朗普声望下滑的唯一原因。特朗普的关税政策、腐败问题、削减医疗保健开支、执着于为自己树立或更名纪念碑，以及与伊朗的战争，都导致了他的联盟瓦解。当副总统万斯将所有责任推给战争，为其他所有失败开脱时，这释放了一个信号：政府只容忍在这一个、唯一的领域提出批评。
The Miller enforcement regimen is obviously not the sole cause of Trump’s unpopularity. Trump’s tariffs, corruption, cuts to health care, obsession with erecting or renaming monuments to himself, and the war with Iran all contributed to the disintegration of his coalition. When Vice President J.D. Vance laid all the blame on the war, absolving every other failure, it sent a signal that the administration would tolerate only criticism in this one, single realm.
米勒的晋升所释放的信号将这一信息推进了一步。据《纽约时报》的玛吉·哈伯曼报道，米勒向特朗普推销自己时，主张结束与伊朗的战争。因此，他的晋升将在单一战线上的撤退——许多特朗普忠实拥趸视此为背叛其“美国优先”原则——与在所有其他战线上推进的决心结合在了一起。
The signal sent by Miller’s elevation takes that message to the next step. Miller pitched himself to Trump as an advocate of winding down the war with Iran, ’s Maggie Haberman reported. His elevation thus combines retreat on a single front—a front many Trump devotees regard as a betrayal of his America First principles—with a determination to advance on every other.
特朗普生活在一个零和世界里，世界在他眼中非赢家即输家。面对挫败，他的本能反应是授意一名助手大干特干，而他自己也承认，这名助手有时做得太过火了。但特朗普无法承认自己失败，也无法让自己表现出任何软弱。与其做得不够，不如做得太过。
Trump dwells in a zero-sum world, divided between winners and losers. His instinct in a moment of defeat is to empower an aide who he himself recognizes has at times gone too far. But Trump cannot admit he has failed, or bring himself to show any weakness. Better to go too far, than not far enough.