A very long, incredibly fluffy profile of Ivanka Trump, courtesy of The Atlantic, tells the story of a woman who, in the wake of her parents’ salacious divorce, was compelled to carefully craft an image for herself as a way to regain a sense of control. That dedication to image has stayed with her: after spending most of her life presenting as a benign counterpoint to the brash Trump name—an entrepreneur and mother, a “woman who works,”—she’s still determined to maintain her reputation, despite making the decision to work closely with her father and attach herself to this administration’s policies.
Which has caused her some short-term ostriciziation:
Ivanka might have laughed had anyone predicted, as the stylist zipped her into that $6,990 Herrera gown [for a Harper’s Bazaar shoot], that in less than a year she would find herself rebuffed by a D.C. workout studio she hadn’t yet heard of—Solidcore, a Pilates-based gym frequented by Michelle Obama. In February 2017, after Ivanka took a class there, the owner, Anne Mahlum, in a since-deleted Facebook post, accused President Trump of “threatening the rights of many of my beloved clients and coaches.” Suddenly, Ivanka was finding herself radioactive. Back in New York, when people had seen her at boutique workout sessions, they’d asked for selfies.
But she also apparently thinks, in the long run, the administration’s legacy of family separation, violent and front-facing racism, and accelerating the killing of the planet won’t really hurt her. More from The Atlantic:
Ivanka believes that this won’t harm her in the long term. She is intent on returning to New York when her time in the White House is over. Invitations to the Met Gala, dinners with girlfriends at Italian restaurants, charity events—she is said to be certain that they’re “all waiting” for her. And she could very well be right. Trump will not be president forever. Afterward, it will be easier for people to see the Ivanka that Ivanka wants to be seen.
Consider its length, there was very little new information gleaned in this piece. Everyone in Ivanka’s orbit—father president, her mother Ivana, Don Jr., and her husband Jared Kushner—went on the record for except Ivanka. (All to say how nice and good she is, of course.) President Trump told The Atlantic that Ivanka would make a brilliant president, or a high-level position at the United Nations, or even leading the World Bank. Yes, it seems that despite Don Jr.’s unique brand of political prowess, it is Ivanka who Trump sees a political future for.
People have short memories, and if George W. Bush giving Michelle Obama a piece of candy can inspire a nauseating chorus of coos, then Ivanka Trump will likely return to New York unscathed.
But who knows, maybe she will shock us all an pivot to EDM once she escapes the Washington beltway:
On a small coffee table when I visited was a book called Playa Fire—about the Burning Man festival, as I’d later learn.
[…]
… I didn’t know how to explain this book on Burning Man, a gathering that seems to represent the opposite of everything I had come to know about Ivanka. When I told a longtime friend of Ivanka’s about the book, she laughed and said, “Really? Huh.”—unsure, too, of what to make of it.
If you see a photo of Trump in five inch metallic boots, fairy wings, fishnets on Instagram in a few years, please tip us off.