Exiles on Pennsylvania Avenue: How Jared and Ivanka Trump Were Repelled by Washington's Elite
“What is off-putting about them,” one political veteran told me, “is they do not grasp their essential irrelevance. They think they are special.”
BY SARAH ELLISON
OCTOBER 2017
Donald Trump hoped the trip would draw a line under the Russia story, which had hounded his candidacy and was now damaging his presidency. His legislative agenda, including repeal of Obamacare, was already in trouble. Looming just ahead were his reckless rhetoric about North Korea and his reaction to the violence in Charlottesville—outright support for white nationalists. But the Russia story—Russia’s interference in the 2016 elections and the possibility of collusion by the Trump campaign—is one with no legal end point in sight. And when Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump woke up in the Hamburg Marriott Hotel on Saturday, July 8, in Hamburg, Germany, they knew that the story was about to get worse, and that the family’s involvement was about to widen.
The couple had accompanied Trump on his second major international trip as president, the centerpiece of which was a meeting of the G-20, hosted by German chancellor Angela Merkel. Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump are senior advisers to the president and were part of the delegation accompanying him, which included chief economic adviser Gary Cohn, National Security Adviser H. R. McMaster, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, and a smattering of West Wing aides. But the 35-year-old Ivanka had a special purpose that day. She was unveiling a $325 million effort she had worked on for months: a World Bank fund, promised to reach $1 billion, to help finance women entrepreneurs in developing countries.
While Jared sat in on a bilateral meeting between Trump and British prime minister Theresa May, Ivanka anchored a panel that included the president of the World Bank, Jim Yong Kim, and the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, Christine Lagarde. Onstage before a row of international flags, Ivanka, with her placid demeanor and her occasional midsentence smile, talked about the importance of enabling women to achieve “economic independence and financial security.” The pale-pink dress she wore, with bell sleeves and large bows, would be featured, as is nearly everything she wears, on fashion blogs and in the Daily Mail, where readers are beckoned to “get Ivanka’s look!” (for considerably less). Immediately following the panel, Ivanka stood in the front row of world leaders and heads of state to have her picture taken, and then listened to herself be praised by Chancellor Merkel, Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau, and her father. At one point, President Trump diverged from his praise of her to note, in a rare moment of self-deprecation, or possibly just self-pity, that “if she weren’t my daughter it would be so much easier for her. It might be the only bad thing she has going, if you want to know the truth.”
Two hours later, Trump tried to reward Ivanka, his favorite child, with a small perk. He asked her to briefly take his place at the conference table between Prime Minister May and the Chinese president, Xi Jinping. It’s not abnormal for a delegate to take the seat of a world leader at such an event, as Angela Merkel would later note. But when a conference aide tweeted a photo of Ivanka at the table, Twitter reacted with disdain at the clear nepotism, a response Ivanka must be getting used to. “This is strange,” noted Michael McFaul, the U.S. ambassador to Russia under Barack Obama. “Very strange.” Even among some Trump loyalists, the breach of protocol was too much. “Excuse me,” said one former Trump adviser. “This is not a royal family, and she’s not the princess royal.” (In fact, “princess royal” is a term that some West Wing advisers apply to her, though never to her face.)
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https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/08/jared-kushner-ivanka-trump-repelled-by-washington-elite
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"What is off-putting about them is they do not grasp their essential irrelevance. They think they are special."
