Bill Ingalls/NASA via ZUMA
Win or lose, Ivanka Trump may be leaving the White House in 2020.
Trump has worked as her father’s adviser during his first term and signaled during an interview on Face the Nation that she would consider leaving the White House even if President Donald Trump wins re-election. It all depends on her kids. “My decisions will always be flexible enough to ensure that their needs are being considered first and foremost,” Trump said. “So they will really drive that answer for me.”
Throughout her time in the White House, Trump has often done damage control following some of her father’s more reckless moments. She, along with her husband and fellow presidential adviser Jared Kushner, reportedly “helped kill” an executive order that would have rolled back LGBT protections in 2017, for instance. Politico reported in 2017 that she reached out quietly to Planned Parenthood “seeking common ground on the contentious issue of abortion,” despite her father’s repeated attacks on reproductive rights.
But with the media often covering her as a moderating force in an extreme administration, some of her allegedly shadier exploits have flown under the radar. The Washington Post reported that she and her husband used a private email to conduct state business—the very same offense that Donald Trump harped on endlessly to win office in 2016. A watchdog group later urged Congress to open an official investigation into the matter. They did, and the investigation is still ongoing.
“It’s really energizing and I’m deeply passionate,” the president’s daughter told CBS’s Margaret Brennan. “The day I don’t walk into the West Wing and feel a shiver up my spine is the day I’ve been here too long.”
