During a meeting with GOP lawmakers at the White House over the summer, Trump rebuked House Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris for raising concerns about the president’s signed tax and spending law. According to people who attended the meeting, Trump demanded that Harris concede his point — then the president suddenly left the room.
After Trump left, Harris vented her anger at James Blair, one of the president’s top advisers. Harris accused Blair of wanting this Find a Republican primary challenger to unseat him.
According to people in the room, Blair responded, “I just work for the President, sir.” This was not a denial.
Blair, a bald 36-year-old Florida activist described by colleagues as intense and fiery, has become a key figure in Trump’s second term — appeasing lawmakers, enforcing loyalty to Trump, shaping the president’s messaging on health care and the economy and plotting White House strategy for next year’s midterm elections. His fingerprints are so visible on the GOP’s redistricting plan that some White House aides refer to it as “Blairmandering.”
Blair’s title—Deputy Chief of Staff—belies his influence. He was among seven senior officials, including the Vice President and the Secretary of State, who represented the administration in a recent Vanity Fair photo shoot. He described himself as a “junkyard dog” in the publication.
“The president has great confidence in him,” Russell Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, said in an interview.
Blair has, so far, kept most Republicans behind Trump. He helped safely pass Trump’s tax-and-spend package, limit GOP defections and win the support of Harris and other conservatives. In a statement, Harris said that “disagreements are not unusual during high-level negotiations,” and called Blair’s work “admirable.” A spokesperson for Harris disputed that the congresswoman raised the possibility of a primary challenge during the White House meeting.
But there are big challenges ahead. Blair is trying to prevent huge Republican losses in the midterms amid deep voter frustration over Trump’s handling of high prices. his boss’s opposition To realign our economic message.
Blair is working to stop Rift in the Republican Party By deepening. And he must persuade skeptical Republicans and the courts to join him in his efforts to redrawn congressional maps.
no longer ‘hard’
Blair was brought into Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign by then-campaign manager Susie Wills, who now serves as White House chief of staff.
Wills and Blair previously worked for Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and later parted ways with him after he was ousted early in the governor’s first year in office. One of Blair’s first jobs for Trump during the 2024 primaries was to attack DeSantis, often using information about the governor he gained from working for him.
Former campaign aides recalled that after Trump’s assassination attempt in July 2024, Blair would sometimes bring a bulletproof vest and a gun to work.
Blair did not initially have a close relationship with Trump, who he told aides at the time that he was “hard”. But according to White House officials, Trump got to know Blair after the election and now talks to him regularly.
According to people who know Blair, he is very stubborn, abusive and is constantly on the phone. Some people in Washington call him “the Oracle” because of his encyclopedic knowledge of data. His sentences often begin like this: “The President wants…”
White House spokeswoman Carolyn Leavitt said, “There’s a reason President Trump calls his White House deputy chief of staff ‘Brilliant James.'”
Blair has sometimes played the role of bad cop and delivered tough news to lawmakers. According to people familiar with the conversations, he told Republicans with concerns about the president’s tax-and-spending package that a vote against the legislation would be a vote against the president and his agenda and would be treated as such. Some MPs saw this as a threat.
Those who know him said he often advises Republican lawmakers on how they should vote, how to campaign, when they should not seek higher office and when Trump is angry. He reminded lawmakers that Trump is more popular in their districts than his, sometimes even conducting polling to reinforce his point. As Trump has pressed to eliminate the filibuster, Blair has met privately with senators in recent weeks to introduce possible changes and see if they would reconsider, people in the meetings said.
Blair has begun advising members on affordability that does not always line up with Trump’s public messaging, saying the issue will be at the center of the midterms.
‘Not much respect’
Blair’s strategy has angered some on Capitol Hill. Members have complained privately that the White House does not understand that Congress is a coequal branch of government. Senior Hill Republicans said some Republicans have announced retirement rather than face re-election, and others are considering retirement.
Retired Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene expressed frustration earlier this year to White House officials that Blair and the White House legislative affairs team were being dismissive toward her, according to a person who heard the complaints. His office did not respond to requests for comment.
“There’s not a lot of respect for Congress,” said Eric Erickson, a conservative activist and radio host. “There’s a lot of, ‘This is what we’re going to do, and you better get involved.'”
In a written statement, Blair wrote to President John F. Cited prepared remarks made by Kennedy in Dallas on the day of his assassination: “There will always be heard in the country disgruntled voices, expressing protest without alternative, finding fault but never partisanship, feeling disappointment on all sides and seeking influence without responsibility.”
Blair has pressured members in competitive districts to run for re-election after learning that they were planning to retire or seek a different office. At times the conversation became heated.
According to people familiar with the matter, he discouraged New York Republican Representative Mike Lawler from running for governor in the state, and he advised Representative Bill Huizenga against running for Senate in Michigan, angering Huizenga. A spokesman for Huizenga declined to comment.
Lawler said, “Is he articulate? Sure. As far as I’m concerned, that’s a good thing. One of the problems in Washington is that too many people are meek.” Blair said she was “extremely grateful” that members listened to her.
In recent months, Blair has turned his attention to the mid-terms. He gave a PowerPoint presentation on specific races and strategies to White House aides and Trump advisers at Camp David. And he has interviewed dozens of potential race candidates, asking questions about their loyalty to Trump, whether they support the president’s agenda, and how they plan to win.
Blair has described himself as “far to the right” to colleagues, but he occasionally presents the President and his team with data showing the potential political weaknesses of the administration’s policies.
He has briefed White House officials on polling that shows immigration raids focused on deporting criminals would be more popular than far-reaching raids. He recently gave charts to Trump that showed how pessimistic many Americans were about the economy and prompted the president to talk about how he could help. According to people who have spoken to him, he has argued internally that there will be a political price to pay if the White House and Trump have no plan to raise health care costs.
In April, Blair presented the President with an aggressive plan to redraw congressional maps to maintain Republican control of the House. According to people familiar with the meeting, the plan was audacious, but Trump liked it and asked Blair to take offense.
Blair tracked votes in the states, kept track of court decisions, negotiated with lawmakers in various states, and worked with outside groups in his personal time to build political support for the president’s plans.
The campaign has had mixed resultsIn some states, like Kansas, Republican lawmakers have defied the White House, surprising even their Democratic colleagues, according to House Democratic Leader Brandon Woodard, In states like Texas, Trump has captured a more favorable map, But it prompted states like California to redraw their maps,
Blair spent weeks pressuring Indiana lawmakers, including Republican state Senate leader Roderick Bray, to support a Trump-backed congressional redistricting plan in the state. In a phone call the night before the vote on the plan, Blair accused Bray of playing games and working against Republicans, according to a person with knowledge of the conversations. Bray told them it was not appropriate to redraw the state maps.
“They’ve been loyal Trump supporters, and when you start bullying them and going after them, it doesn’t reflect a good understanding of your audience,” said Mark Short, a former Trump official turned critic.
Bray and Indiana lawmakers were not impressed. rejected the planNow, Trump allies are threatening not to support state Republican leaders in the primaries,
Write to Josh Dawsey here joshua.docsey@WSJ.com
