Reprinted with permission from Shareblue.
Ivanka Trump often tries to take credit for being a positive influence on Trump, but she proved once again this week that her efforts are just for show.
Buried in a New York Times report this weekend was this detail: Ivanka suggested using a sham event celebrating “America’s workers” to distract from Trump’s disastrous attempts to cover for his arguably treasonous conduct with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin:
When it was clear that the news cycle had not jumped ahead, Mr. Trump’s daughter Ivanka looked for ways to push the narrative away from Russia. On Thursday morning, at a senior staff meeting, Ms. Trump, a senior adviser to the president, told the group that she wanted help keeping her father on message, according to a person briefed on what took place. She said her worker retraining announcement with her father later in the afternoon at the White House could provide a pivot toward a new story.
The event was a classic Trump photo op with all “the pomp of a reality-show reveal episode,” according to another Times report.
As usual, it was all style and no substance — and as usual, Trump managed to find yet another opportunity to embarrass himself.
The event rolled out the “Pledge to America’s Workers,” an initiative spearheaded by Ivanka Trump that purports to create millions of “opportunities” for American workers. In reality, however, it mostly takes credit for actions that American companies were already planning to take.
As part of the initiative, the New York Times reports, “companies and trade unions have committed to funding nearly four million slots for apprenticeships, retraining and continuing education programs over the next five years.”
However, the Times notes, most of those companies and organizations “had already planned to greatly increase their job training and apprenticeship programs” before Trump’s initiative.
And when the true number of “opportunities” the companies offered wasn’t large enough, Trump “expanded the definition” to include programs for workers who already work at those companies.
But even at this canned event for a hollow policy initiative, Ivanka Trump’s dad couldn’t avoid making a fool of himself.
In a moment that has been widely ridiculed, Trump expressed amazement that the name of his TV show, “The Apprentice,” is similar to the word “apprenticeships.”
“That’s an interesting word for me to be saying, right? ‘The Apprentice,’” Trump told the crowd. “I never actually put that together until just now. Isn’t that strange? Ivanka, I never associated — but here we are. Can’t get away from that word.”
Now we know that this wasn’t just any embarrassing moment for Trump — it was Ivanka Trump’s best hope to redeem her dad after possibly the most disastrous week of his presidency so far.
Ivanka Trump wasn’t above using a hollow, exploitative photo op to try to cover for her father’s Russia crisis. And even that cynical attempt failed spectacularly.
It’s insulting enough that Ivanka would try to use American workers as a human shield for Trump’s Russia debacle. But it’s even more disgusting given that her own clothing line outsources jobs to China — and that her father’s trade war just happens to target her competitors.
Ivanka Trump’s plan didn’t get any traction, most likely because it’s not much of a plan. But this incident is just more evidence that, despite her efforts to cultivate this image, she is no “moderating influence” on Trump at all.
Published with permission of The American Independent.
