Tragic Details About Ivanka Trump

Ivanka Trump regularly wears ridiculously expensive outfits and jet sets with her family, but even the most privileged of nepotism beneficiaries have problems. Growing up in the spotlight hasn't always been easy for Ivanka, and her transition from working in her father's real estate business to consulting him at the White House was not a smooth one.

Ivanka seemed to experience the most adversity when Donald Trump became politically ambitious, which perhaps left her longing for the days when her troubles were more trivial. For example, she spent some unhappy years attending school at Choate Rosemary Hall, which is located in Connecticut. It was difficult for Ivanka to leave her heiress life in Manhattan behind. "I was all of a sudden in the prison of boarding-school life, and all my friends in New York were having fun," she told Marie Claire in 2007.

In 2017, Ivanka published a book titled "Women Who Work: Rewriting the Rules for Success." In it, she touched on the campaign work she did for Donald and shared some of the sacrifices she had to make. "Honestly, I wasn't treating myself to a massage or making much time for self-care," she wrote. She had no idea that missing out on her "me" time was going to become the least of her concerns. But at least she was accustomed to unwanted media attention before she started becoming a magnet for negative headlines.

Some of Donald Trump's cringeworthy behavior is to blame for the occasional discomfort Ivanka Trump experiences as a public figure. She complained to Marie Claire about the "nightmare" she had to deal with after her dad joked about finding her attractive enough to date. She was haunted by his comments again when they resurfaced during his first presidential campaign. But Donald's actions adversely affecting Ivanka dates back at least to the '90s, when her parents were going through a messy divorce. At the time, tabloids were regularly churning out sordid stories about Donald's extramarital affair with Marla Maples.

Ivanka was leaving school one day when a reporter asked the then-9-year-old about Maples purportedly describing her romantic encounters with Donald as the "best sex I ever had." Ivanka told Marie Claire, "It was a terribly unpleasant experience. It gave me a glimpse into how ugly the world can be."

Speaking to New York Magazine about that same day, Ivanka recounted how she found some of the questions being flung at her by the media mob confusing because she was so young. "In retrospect, I can look back and say, 'How was it possible that we didn't have to go to intense therapy for the next eight years?'" she stated. Ivanka was seemingly able to forgive her father for cheating on her mother, Ivana Trump, but she told GQ, "The situation with Marla was very tricky. I mean, I will never totally forgive her."

Ivanka Trump lost a few famous friends when she decided to support her father's presidential aspirations and later join his administration. She had once been close with Chelsea Clinton, the daughter of Donald Trump's political rival Hillary Clinton, but their relationship deteriorated amid the charged political climate. "I have 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," Chelsea said on "Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen" in 2020.

Model Karlie Kloss, Jared Kushner's sister-in-law, is another celeb who took issue with Ivanka's embrace of her dad's political agenda. After she openly disavowed the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol in 2021, one user on X, formerly known as Twitter, begged Kloss to tell Ivanka and Jared that the behavior of Donald and the insurrectionists was wrong. "I've tried," Kloss replied.

While Ivanka's celebrity pals received the most attention for speaking out about her, one of her non-famous ex-friends was responsible for sharing one of the most scathing critiques of her character. In a Vanity Fair piece, Ivanka's former schoolmate and friend, Lysandra Ohrstrom, painted a portrait of a shallow heiress with mean girl tendencies. She also wrote, "I've grown increasingly repulsed by Ivanka's ability to aid and abet her father." It's hard to imagine Ivanka not feeling any pang of hurt that someone she was once close to now thinks so lowly of her.

Ivanka Trump's eponymous fashion brand was something she could finally call her own. Sure, her famous surname was still attached to it, but her father and brothers weren't involved in making business decisions. She seemed passionate about her solo endeavor, telling Teen Vogue in 2012, "Having the ability to now really dress a woman from head to toe is also a very exciting feeling!" But instead of continuing to find ways to set herself apart from the other Trumps, she became even more enmeshed in the family's dealings when they became political.

After Donald Trump won the 2016 presidential election, Ivanka's company was targeted by the Grab Your Wallet campaign, which encouraged customers to boycott any products associated with the Trumps. When Nordstrom announced that it was dropping Ivanka's brand, it blamed struggling sales for its decision. Neiman Marcus and Hudson's Bay were among the other retailers that stopped selling the line. After Ivanka ceased being involved with her brand's operations in 2017 to enter her father's administration as an advisor, Jared Kushner told the Financial Times, "It's not easy for her to give up the business that she's built."

The company became one of the casualties of Donald's presidency in 2018 when Ivanka decided to shut it down completely. In a statement to Page Six, she explained that she intended to focus on the work she was doing in Washington, D.C. "It's just never recovered since she stepped away," a source stated.

According to some reports, there was never any hope of Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner resuming their old social life in New York City once Donald Trump's presidency ended. "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," one ex-pal told Vanity Fair. Another source claimed to Town & Country the couple had gone to Washington in hopes of improving their social status. However, the insider dished, "The type of people they were trying to impress when they left won't have anything to do with them."

Anne Mahlum, the owner of the Solidcore studio in D.C., shamed Ivanka for using a fake name when enrolling in one of her fitness classes in 2017. In since-deleted Facebook posts (via CNBC), Mahlum explained her decision to call Ivanka out by stating that some of the Trump administration's policies could harm her clients.

Ivanka's life after the White House included a scenery change. While she and Jared were no longer flitting around Manhattan's liberal-leaning circles, they still faced some hostility in Florida. Per Page Six, members of the exclusive Indian Creek Country Club near the couple's home planned on denying them entry if they tried to join. Speaking to the Washingtonian in 2022, a neighbor also shamed Ivanka for ignoring a rule banning dogs from a local beach.

Ivanka Trump could do no right during her political career. She wasn't the mitigating force on her father many voters on the left would have liked her to be, but she also didn't possess that all-in-on-MAGA mentality that her father's supporters seem to fancy. There were countless headlines letting Ivanka know just how controversial her involvement in Donald Trump's presidency was. They include a Vanity Fair piece titled "The Trouble with Ivanka Trump's Ambition" and an op-ed from The Washington Post warning, "Ivanka Trump's White House role is a symbol of democratic decline."

Ivanka's appearance at the 2017 W20 Summit was met with boos. According to BuzzFeed News, some members of the audience didn't seem to buy it when she said of her father, "He's been a tremendous champion of supporting families and enabling them to thrive." The internet also ridiculed Ivanka in 2019 when a video of her awkwardly attempting to converse with French President Emmanuel Macron, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and former U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May went viral on X. "When the waitress forgets she's s'posed to run go get those drinks," quipped actor Jeffrey Wright.

Ivanka also got the "Saturday Night Live" treatment. In her book "Unhinged: An Insider's Account of the Trump White House" (via People), Omarosa Manigault Newman claimed Ivanka wasn't happy about Scarlett Johansson playing her in a spoof ad for a fragrance called Complicit. "Ivanka couldn't stop bemoaning it," Newman wrote.

During a 2017 appearance on "The Dr. Oz Show," Ivanka Trump opened up about her struggles with postpartum depression. Ivanka shared that she experienced postpartum after the births of all three of her children: daughter Arabella and sons Joseph and Theodore. "It was a very challenging, emotional time for me because I felt like I was not living up to my potential as a parent or as an entrepreneur and as an executive," she said. She added that her pregnancies had otherwise been a breeze, but this just made the way she felt after giving birth seem even worse.

The decision to speak about something so painful is often met with a flood of support online, but Ivanka also faced some criticism over her association with the Republican party. A Vice op-ed accused her of being a hypocrite, pointing out that her father's administration was taking actions at the time that would potentially strip mental health care from women. On X, Ivanka also failed to elicit compassion from some users. "The women who don't have health insurance, money, round the clock nannies, maids, and cooks do not identify w/her," one person wrote. There were also suggestions that Ivanka's interview was just a publicity stunt to get people to view her more favorably, or a means of diverting attention away from some of her father's unpopular political moves.

Ivanka Trump had a close relationship with Ivana Trump, so she was devastated when her beloved mother died unexpectedly in July 2022. Ivanka closed a Facebook tribute to Ivana by writing, "I will miss her forever and will keep her memory alive in our hearts always." Speaking to the New York Post, Ivanka remembered her mom as someone full of boundless energy. "She'd tire out people — even men younger than she," the bereaved daughter said. Ivana would also be a comforting presence and a caretaker when her kids needed her.

Two years after Ivana's death, Ivanka reflected on how difficult it was to lose someone she looked up to so much. "It's unbelievable how dislocating the loss of a parent is," she said on the "Lex Fridman Podcast." Ivanka took comfort in being left with many happy memories of her mom, who loved swimming in the ocean with her, and it sounds like Ivana was someone who lived life to the fullest.

Unfortunately, Ivanka had some regrets about the time she spent with her mom. She revealed that she would have liked to talk to Ivana more about her life in communist Czechoslovakia, something she wasn't fond of speaking about. Ivanka got emotional while sharing her plan to broach the subject with her grandmother. "I can ask her some of the questions that I would've ... Sorry. I wanted to ask my own mom, but it's hard," she said while choking up.

Ivanka Trump wasn't present at the Pennsylvania rally where a gunman opened fire on her father, leaving him with a bloody ear. However, she did send Donald Trump a message of support on social media. "Thank you for your love and prayers for my father and for the other victims of today's senseless violence," she tweeted. "I love you Dad, today and always." According to Hola!, Ivanka met with Donald Trump in Bedminster, New Jersey on the evening of the assassination attempt, so she was clearly worried about her dad.

Donald was also on Ivanka's mind when she marked the two-year anniversary of her mother's death. The date of the sad occasion happened to fall on was the day after the shooting. It was possibly because of this that Ivanka couldn't help but see a connection between the two tragic events. "I believe [Ivana] was watching over Dad last night during the attempt on his life," she tweeted. "I miss her every day and pray for the safety of the family and friends she left behind."

At that time, Ivanka and Donald hadn't been hanging out in public together as much as they used to due to Ivanka's decision to step away from politics. It was looking like she wanted to put plenty of distance between herself and her dad, but after he came close to losing his life, she made a rare appearance with him at the Republican National Convention.

Ivanka Trump liked her college sweetheart Greg Hersch enough to attempt the nearly impossible after their 2001 breakup. "It's difficult being friends with an ex," she lamented to GQ. Her love life got even messier after she started dating Jared Kushner. In his book, "Breaking History: A White House Memoir," Kushner recalled how he and Ivanka immediately hit it off and discovered that they shared many common interests. But he later realized there was a major problem with his dream girl. "I grew concerned about our different religions. As hard and painful as it was, I broke up with her," he wrote.

In the book, "Kushner, Inc.: Greed. Ambition. Corruption. The Extraordinary Story of Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump," author Vicky Ward posited that Kushner's parents, Charlie and Seryl, were extremely upset when they learned their son was dating a girl who wasn't Jewish. "Jared's parents were horrified by the match," Ward writes, adding, "Charlie and Seryl refused to even meet Ivanka." Their feelings about the relationship were reportedly part of the reason Kushner dumped Ivanka.

Kushner eventually realized he had messed up big time, and he was lucky that Ivanka took him back — she even decided to convert to Judaism. But according to a 2022 Radar report, it wasn't totally smooth sailing from there. A source told the outlet Ivanka's refusal to completely sever ties with her father was testing their marriage. "They're always fighting and can barely contain their growing animosity for each other," the insider claimed.

Ivanka Trump had a rough go of it in Washington D.C., where some people who were supposed to be her allies reportedly did not treat her as such. In "Breaking History," Jared Kushner claimed that Donald Trump's former White House chief of staff, John Kelly, once pushed Ivanka when they crossed paths outside the Oval Office. According to The New York Times, another former Trump administration member who was no fan of Ivanka, chief strategist Steve Bannon, was telling people, "Those days are over when Ivanka can run in and lay her head on the desk and cry."

Ivanka even reportedly got on her father's bad side. In her book, "Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America" (via CNN), journalist Maggie Haberman claimed that Donald once came close to tweeting that Ivanka and Jared Kushner were exiting his administration — without warning them first.

Ivanka decided that she wanted to avoid the circus when her father decided to run for president again in 2024. She shared her decision two years out from the election, telling Fox News she wanted to focus on raising her kids. On the "Lex Fridman Podcast," she revealed that the often ugly nature of politics also played into her decision. "There's a lot of darkness, a lot of negativity," she said. "And it's just really at odds with what feels good for me as a human being."