The decline of Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner
The couple has lost luster and influence in the last year, haunted by legal problems and weakened by the president's disruptive decisions.
They were the couple of the moment. Thirty-something wealthy entrepreneurs with constant access to the President of the United States. Omnipresent and powerful. They were said to pull many strings in the backroom of the White House and to be an influence of moderation. A year later, the aura around Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner has faded. The daughter of Donald Trump and her son-in-law, both advisers to the White House and without any previous political experience, have lost their mark in the second year of the presidency, haunted by legal problems and weakened by the president's turn towards breakthrough positions.
The sunset was symbolically visualized last Monday. Ivanka and Jared traveled to Jerusalem to participate in the inauguration ceremony of the new American Embassy. There was an uncomfortable duality: around the same time that the US delegation celebrated the transfer of the diplomatic headquarters from Tel Aviv, Israeli forces killed dozens of protesters in Gaza who were protesting against the decision. Ivanka's broad smile during the inauguration has been widely criticized in the US The tension also highlighted the failure of Kushner, in charge of the relationship between Israelis and Palestinians. His main task is to promote a peace plan that has never been revealed and that now seems impossible given the Palestinian outrage over the change in the Embassy.
A year earlier, Ivanka and Jared - practitioners of Judaism - had already visited Jerusalem. They accompanied Donald Trump on his first overseas tour as president. An analysis this week by the Israeli daily Haaretz recalled how some then described the Republican's daughter as the “most powerful Jewish woman” in the US That visit, which included a trip to the West Bank, was prepared in detail by Kushner, of whom Trump was full of praise. The day before assuming the presidency, in January 2017, he was confident that his son-in-law would do a “great job” in achieving what no one has ever achieved: a sustained peace agreement in the world's most volatile region.
Those words now provoke derision. “The president has realized that he can only do so little. Kushner is not a panacea and it is not going to push for a solution, ”says George C. Edwards III, Distinguished Professor of Political Science at Texas A&M University, by phone. He considers it a “ridiculous notion” to believe that Kushner, who lacked international experience, could solve one of the world's greatest hieroglyphs thanks to his family friendship with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
At the start of Trump's presidency, Kushner's portfolio was endless. Apart from dealing with the Middle East, he launched a technological innovation initiative, another on the prison system, supervised the relationship with Mexico ... A year later, Kushner is still officially involved in these tasks, but his power, which seemed overwhelming, has been limited.
First, by the appointment in June 2017 of John Kelly as Trump's chief of staff and that he raised new barriers around the president. And second, due to the withdrawal last February of Kushner's maximum security credential due to the numerous flaws in the information provided to the FBI about his economic and international contacts. According to expert Edwards, it is telling that Trump has done nothing to try to regain that protection for his son-in-law, which could reflect that he has distanced himself from him.
Until then, Kushner's undisclosed meetings with Russian personalities during the election campaign had earned him an investigation by Robert Mueller, the special prosecutor who analyzes Moscow's interference in the presidential elections. But, with the loss of the security credential, he has been relegated: he no longer has access to the daily meeting in which the president is informed of the greatest security risks in the world. In parallel, information has emerged about attempts by foreign countries to try to manipulate Kushner through his family's real estate network.
Ivanka Trump has fewer problems than her husband but she is not exempt from them. The FBI investigation of Michael Cohen, her father's obscure personal attorney, runs the risk of splashing her because the attorney helped the family seal business deals abroad. As Trump's adviser, Ivanka has focused primarily on issues related to women's empowerment. It has achieved milestones, such as the creation of an international fund sponsored by the World Bank.
The couple has lost luster and influence in the last year, haunted by legal problems and weakened by the president's disruptive decisions.
They were the couple of the moment. Thirty-something wealthy entrepreneurs with constant access to the President of the United States. Omnipresent and powerful. They were said to pull many strings in the backroom of the White House and to be an influence of moderation. A year later, the aura around Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner has faded. The daughter of Donald Trump and her son-in-law, both advisers to the White House and without any previous political experience, have lost their mark in the second year of the presidency, haunted by legal problems and weakened by the president's turn towards breakthrough positions.
The sunset was symbolically visualized last Monday. Ivanka and Jared traveled to Jerusalem to participate in the inauguration ceremony of the new American Embassy. There was an uncomfortable duality: around the same time that the US delegation celebrated the transfer of the diplomatic headquarters from Tel Aviv, Israeli forces killed dozens of protesters in Gaza who were protesting against the decision. Ivanka's broad smile during the inauguration has been widely criticized in the US The tension also highlighted the failure of Kushner, in charge of the relationship between Israelis and Palestinians. His main task is to promote a peace plan that has never been revealed and that now seems impossible given the Palestinian outrage over the change in the Embassy.
A year earlier, Ivanka and Jared - practitioners of Judaism - had already visited Jerusalem. They accompanied Donald Trump on his first overseas tour as president. An analysis this week by the Israeli daily Haaretz recalled how some then described the Republican's daughter as the “most powerful Jewish woman” in the US That visit, which included a trip to the West Bank, was prepared in detail by Kushner, of whom Trump was full of praise. The day before assuming the presidency, in January 2017, he was confident that his son-in-law would do a “great job” in achieving what no one has ever achieved: a sustained peace agreement in the world's most volatile region.
Those words now provoke derision. “The president has realized that he can only do so little. Kushner is not a panacea and it is not going to push for a solution, ”says George C. Edwards III, Distinguished Professor of Political Science at Texas A&M University, by phone. He considers it a “ridiculous notion” to believe that Kushner, who lacked international experience, could solve one of the world's greatest hieroglyphs thanks to his family friendship with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
At the start of Trump's presidency, Kushner's portfolio was endless. Apart from dealing with the Middle East, he launched a technological innovation initiative, another on the prison system, supervised the relationship with Mexico ... A year later, Kushner is still officially involved in these tasks, but his power, which seemed overwhelming, has been limited.
First, by the appointment in June 2017 of John Kelly as Trump's chief of staff and that he raised new barriers around the president. And second, due to the withdrawal last February of Kushner's maximum security credential due to the numerous flaws in the information provided to the FBI about his economic and international contacts. According to expert Edwards, it is telling that Trump has done nothing to try to regain that protection for his son-in-law, which could reflect that he has distanced himself from him.
Until then, Kushner's undisclosed meetings with Russian personalities during the election campaign had earned him an investigation by Robert Mueller, the special prosecutor who analyzes Moscow's interference in the presidential elections. But, with the loss of the security credential, he has been relegated: he no longer has access to the daily meeting in which the president is informed of the greatest security risks in the world. In parallel, information has emerged about attempts by foreign countries to try to manipulate Kushner through his family's real estate network.
Ivanka Trump has fewer problems than her husband but she is not exempt from them. The FBI investigation of Michael Cohen, her father's obscure personal attorney, runs the risk of splashing her because the attorney helped the family seal business deals abroad. As Trump's adviser, Ivanka has focused primarily on issues related to women's empowerment. It has achieved milestones, such as the creation of an international fund sponsored by the World Bank.
