Ivanka’s Back In the Picture

This was foretold. And again, you don’t need to be Nostradamus to have seen it coming. Jared Kushner is keeping a basically low profile due to his obtaining of $2 billion in Saudi investments. That’s always been the elephant in the room since the day it happened. While James Comer cobbled together an imaginary world wherein Hunter Biden was handing his father the moon and the stars via Ukraine, Trump’s son-in-law was in fact using his proximity to the American president to obtain considerable advantage. It is the most under reported scandal of its size and nature in American history.

Meanwhile, Jared’s better half, Ivanka, declared that she was leaving politics because it was basically an offense to her core values. We won’t bother to point out that both her father and her father-in-law are convicted felons, so her taking the high moral ground does strike one as either incredibly hypocritical or unbelievably tone deaf. In Ivanka’s case it could be both. Here she is doing her Pushmi Pullyou act. CNN:

“Politics is – it’s a pretty dark world. There’s a lot of darkness, a lot of negativity, and it’s just really at odds with what feels good for me as a human being,” she told “The Lex Fridman Podcast” in a three-hour conversation this July. “And you know, it’s a really rough business. So for me and my family, it feels right to not participate,” she added in what was her most substantive public reflection on her time in Washington and her life after.

Still, a private life may prove elusive as a high-profile member of America’s incoming first family, one with a carefully cultivated personal brand and significant influence, beloved to many of the president-elect’s supporters and a target of many of his detractors.

Trump remains very close with her father, with whom she talks regularly, a source close to her said. And she is likely to continue to informally advise him on a range of issues behind-the-scenes, sources told CNN.

Politics has its dark side, yes, but it wasn’t until Ivanka’s father came on the scene, combining his fantasy character on The Apprentice with a vacuum of leadership in the GOP, that utter darkness fell upon the political land. Donald Trump has made a sham and a mockery of all our institutions and since his election last month, we are now the laughingstock of the world, with his threats towards Canada, Mexico, Panama and now Greenland.

Ivanka seems to want her cake and eat it, too. It’s nice to know that she’s not going to have an office in the White House. In fact, Melania probably approves of that, even though Melania is likely to spend the bulk of her time in New York. It will be intriguing to see how things actually work out in the First Marriage, the template for dysfunctional relationships everywhere.

Ivanka is not completely stupid. She knows how her father is hated and John Kelly correctly pegged Ivanka and Jared when he said, “They play at government.” Most people in public life, especially the ones who have been there for a while, have worked hard to get and stay where they are. The best among them have done a lot of good for the American people. It’s understandable — unless Ivanka is as dense as Daddy — that they would look askance at a family of carpetbaggers, whose only credentials are wealth and a successful TV show. Mostly a successful TV show.

There would be no Donald Trump presidency, either in 2016 or now, without The Apprentice. The Apprentice is a thing of artifice and Trump is not the uber successful self made businessman that he played on television.

Ivanka knows this better than anybody. And it will be interesting to see to what extent she returns to public life and the scrutiny that that entails. My sense of things is that as Trump gets rolling in January and it becomes evident that he can’t deliver on his campaign promises, and people get understandably miffed, that Ivanka will make like a tortoise and pull her head in. I think that all that’s happening now is a testing of the waters.

Here’s the bottom line: Basically anybody who understands politics to any extent is predicting that Trump 2.0 will be a disaster. From what we’ve seen already vis a vis cabinet appointments, DOGE, and Trump walking back his promises to lower grocery prices, it looks like those predictions are well grounded. Ivanka can choose to be a part of this shitshow or she can sit it out. I think she’ll choose to sit it out.

That said, she loves the spotlight and the power as much as anybody. If she can figure out a way to grab that and not be identified with her father’s ridiculous administration, she’ll do it. But that’s a pretty tall order. So it won’t be easy.

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