Ivanka Trump is visiting Germany in her role as . . . well, we don’t know exactly what her role is. The White House says she is a “Special Assistant” to the president. In fact, she’s so special, she is getting her own chief of staff, spokesperson, and understaff. A wholly unprecedented move by the White House. Nevertheless, Ivanka has been dispatched to Germany to meet with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and leading German women, who are apparently equally perplexed about her role. According to Politico, she had a rough welcome and was immediately peppered with questions about her role:
“You’re the first daughter of the United States, and you’re also an assistant to the president,” the moderator, WirtschaftsWoche editor-in-chief Miriam Meckel, said. “The German audience is not that familiar with the concept of a first daughter. I’d like to ask you, what is your role, and who are you representing, your father as president of the United States, the American people, or your business?”
Ivanka Trump did nothing to clarify her role:
She did not define what her new role as a senior White House official entailed, but said that she cared "very much about empowering women in the workplace" and defined her goal as enacting “incremental positive change. That is my goal. This is very early for me, I’m listening, learning.”
The crowd took a turn for the worse when she tried to sell her father as a champion for women:
But she was booed and hissed at by the majority-women audience at the conference when she lauded her father for supporting paid leave policies. “I’m very proud of my father’s advocacy,” she said, calling him “a tremendous champion of supporting families and enabling them to thrive.”
Meckel, the moderator, pushed her to address the vocal disapproval from the audience.
“You hear the reaction from the audience,” she said. “I need to address one more point -- some attitudes toward women your father has displayed might leave one questioning whether he’s such an empower-er for women.”
Ivanka Trump goes on to say she’s “heard the criticism and it’s been perpetuated in the media.” Yes, Ivanka, this is all the media’s fault for releasing audio and video of your father acting like an utter pig toward women. Here’s the full video. The remarks about her dad being a champion of women’s issues begins around the 14:00 minute mark.
