Ivanka Trump previously raised eyebrows among Trump critics during her attendance at the 2017 G20 summit in Hamburg when she briefly sat in for her father during one of the meetings with world leaders. She has since become more neatly tailored to issues of women's economic empowerment and workforce development. Yet she still advises her father on a myriad of issues internally. She has been one of his longest and most-trusted advisers, starting with her time in the family real estate business.
Former Obama State Department spokesperson, Pentagon press secretary and CNN analyst John Kirby said that her outsize role during the trip raises "legitimate concerns" regarding the transparency of Trump's responsibilities as a White House official, and, subsequently, her lack of accountability mechanisms as an unelected staffer.
"It raises real questions about what policy issues does she have a stake in and does she have authority to speak for the United States on," Kirby said to CNN.
To him, her visibility is an "optics problem" for the administration.
"I found it fairly stunning that she had a seat at so many tables and was involved in so many bilateral policy discussions," he said. "It certainly doesn't help America's standing on the world's stage as a democratic representative government because she wasn't elected by anybody and hasn't been formally appointed to any position."
The gray area she occupies — family, employee, envoy, advocate — frequently overlaps with the work of career diplomats. But her unfamiliarity with some elements of diplomacy were on display on this trip, including when she pronounced India a “critical ally.” It is a partner in many areas, but U.S. diplomats avoid the higher terminology of ally.
Mostly, her prominence on a major foreign trip sends a message about who other countries should listen to or court, said Christopher R. Hill, a former U.S. ambassador to South Korea and other nations. |
