Ivanka Trump distanced herself from her family by hiring her own lawyer for an upcoming lawsuit against the Trump Organization: report
- Ivanka Trump hired her own lawyer to represent her in an upcoming $250 million lawsuit, per Forbes.
- She ditched the attorneys representing her brothers, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump.
Ivanka Trump has distanced herself from her family, notably her brothers Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, by ditching their attorneys and hiring her own to represent her in an upcoming civil lawsuit, Forbes reported.
Former President Donald Trump, his three eldest children, and the Trump Organization are named in a $250 million fraud civil lawsuit, in which New York Attorney General Letitia James is also seeking to permanently bar the Trumps from officiating or directing any businesses in New York.
The Trumps, their real-estate company, and its top executives are accused of inflating the value of properties to secure cheaper loans.
The defendants dispute the allegations.
Shortly after the lawsuit was filed in September, the Trump brothers hired attorneys Clifford Robert and Michael Farina to represent them.
The following month, Ivanka Trump also retained the attorneys to work alongside two Washington, DC, lawyers, Reid Figel and Michael Kellogg, whom she had hired separately, per Forbes.
But last week, Kellogg and Figel withdrew from the case, and Ivanka Trump brought on Bennet Moskowitz, who formerly represented Jeffrey Epstein's estate, as her sole legal counsel, Forbes reported.
Newsweek reported that while breaking off from a family's legal representation isn't unusual, as defendants might seek to have their own interests best represented, the timing is.
Michael McAuliffe, a former federal prosecutor, told the news outlet that the lawsuit's discovery period is nearing an end, with the trial set to begin in October, which means that the evidence in the case is already "largely identified and developed."
McAuliffe said that "it might well be that Ivanka Trump is looking ahead to the trial in the fall and wants a separate advocate who is free to point out the disparity in the evidence against the various defendants."
He added: "A lawyer representing all or several of the defendants can't realistically or effectively make that argument."
This isn't the first time the former president's eldest daughter has tried to distance herself from the family.
She said in November 2022 that her time in politics was over and that she wouldn't help her father's 2024 presidential campaign. And she was noticeably absent from his campaign launch.
Insider contacted Robert, Farina, Figel, Kellogg, Moskowitz, and the Trump Organization for comment but did not immediately receive responses.