How Ivanka Trump lost friends and was shunned by US high society after joining her father in politics
Sophia Ankel
- Ivanka Trump last week said her time in politics was over even as her father seeks a new term.
- Her time in Donald Trump's campaigns and administration came at a high social cost for Ivanka.
Ivanka Trump said in November 2022 that her time in politics was over, and that she wouldn't help Donald Trump's 2024 campaign.
Ivanka Trump was notably absent from former President Donald Trump's campaign launch in Palm Beach, Florida.
In a public statement after the launch, she said: "I love my father very much. This time around, I am choosing to prioritize my children and the private life we are creating as a family. I do not plan to be involved in politics."
Source: Insider
The announcement hinted at the personal cost she paid for playing a public role in Trump's political career.
An unnamed source told the New York Post that Ivanka wanted out — and to live "as normal a life as she can."
She and her husband, Jared Kushner, have three children: Arabella, 11, Joseph, nine, and Theodore, six.
Source: The New York Post
Prior to working in the White House, Ivanka was a businesswoman, runway model, and fashion designer. She was popular.
Source: Insider
She has been famous her entire life. She even starred in a 2003 documentary about growing up rich and famous.
As an avid Manhattan socialite, Ivanka was often invited to red-carpet events and has been pictured with other celebrities, including Vogue editor Anna Wintour.
Source: Insider
That started to change when Trump launched his 2015 presidential campaign, putting his family front and center.
Ivanka joined him on the campaign trail, making high-profile speeches at events like the Republican National Convention in July 2016.
When he won the 2016 election, Trump soon appointed Ivanka and her husband, Jared Kushner, as unpaid White House advisors.
Source: Insider
During her time in the White House, Ivanka faced fierce criticism from those who wanted her to use her influence to stop Trump implementing some his policies.
Source: Insider
In 2017, major retailers ditched Ivanka's clothing brand following customer protests and weak sales.
Some of the retailers who dropped Ivanka's clothing brands included Nordstrom, Neiman Marcus, Gilt, and Burlington.
In July 2018, Ivanka was forced to shut down her fashion company, saying in a statement: "I do not know when or if I will ever return to the business, but I do know that my focus for the foreseeable future will be the work I am doing here in Washington."
Source: Insider
The commercial appeared to upset Ivanka, who "couldn't stop bemoaning it" at a senior staff meeting, Omarosa Newman, a former political aide to Trump, said in 2018.
Source: Vanity Fair
In a separate interview, Ivanka responded to the skit by saying: "If being complicit is wanting to be a force for good and to make a positive impact, then I'm complicit."
"I hope to make a positive impact, I don't know what it means to be complicit, but I hope time will prove that I have done a good job and much more importantly, my father's administration is the success that I know it will be," Ivanka told CBS Mornings.
Source: CBS Mornings
In 2018, a string of celebrities whom Ivanka followed on social media made a concerted effort to shame her over the Trump administration's policy of separating migrant children from their families at the US border.
Ivanka said that she was against her father's family separation policy and urged him to end it, calling it "a low point."
But celebrities — including fashion designer Alexa Chung, and actress Amy Schumer — were not happy with her response.
They launched a "Dear Ivanka" social-media campaign, which involved sharing an Instagram post saying: "Dear Ivanka, you follow me on social media. You said family separation was a 'low point' for you. The low point is for the separated families."
"You spoke in the past tense. The crisis is still ongoing," it continued.
President Joe Biden signed executive orders last year aimed to dismantle Trump's immigration policies over the years.
Source: Insider
When Kushner and Ivanka traveled to Rome for a wedding in 2019, other guests shunned them to avoid being in the same photos, Vanity Fair reported.
Source: Vanity Fair
Ivanka also lost many friends due to her role in the White House.
Lysandra Ohrstrom, Ivanka Trump's childhood best friend, said last year that their different stances on social issues led to them growing apart.
"I think it's past time that one of the many critics from Ivanka's childhood comes forward – if only to ensure that she really will never recover from the decision to tie her fate to her father's," Ohrstrom wrote in a tell-all essay published in Vanity Fair.
Source: Insider
Ivanka also used to be friends with Chelsea Clinton, the daughter of Trump's 2016 rival Hillary Clinton and former President Bill Clinton.
But Chelsea Clinton said in 2020 that she decided to cut her ties with Ivanka because she had "no interest in being friends with someone who is not only complicit but actively taking part in this administration's everyday collision of cruelty and incompetence."
Source: Insider
Ivanka was hurt by how friends "turned their backs" on her during her father's administration, an unnamed source told The New York Post after she said she wouldn't return to politics.
Source: The New York Post
After Trump lost the 2020 election, a Vanity Fair report claimed that Ivanka and Kushner would not be welcomed back in some New York circles if they tried to return to the city, citing interviews with former friends.
"They'll be welcomed back by people who know the Trumps are as close as they'll get to power," one former friend told Vanity Fair.
"But everyone with self-respect, a career, morals, respect for democracy, or who doesn't want their friends to shame them both in private and public will steer clear," they added.
Source: Vanity Fair
Ivanka and Kushner ended up choosing Miami, Florida, over New York City and have been spending time with their three children.
A source told The New York Post that she "hated all the criticism and the threats" that came with being in politics.
Source: The New York Post
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