Jared and Ivanka are poised to return to a Manhattan

social scene that no longer welcomes them

edition.cnn.com/2020/11/14/politics/jared-kushner-ivanka-trump-post-white-house/index.html

November 14, 2020

New York (CNN)If the celebrations that spilled into the streets of New York City in the
wake of Joe Biden's victory made one thing clear, it's that the Trumps aren't welcome
here.

For the President, who changed his primary residency last year to Florida, that's
perhaps no major loss, but for Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, the block parties
celebrating the demise of the Trump administration may provide a glimpse of what
awaits them once they exit the White House.
Now that their political lives in Washington are over -- the question for this once-golden
power couple is what their time in the political spotlight has meant for their brand,
particularly in their old Manhattan stomping grounds.
"[The President] was so awful and divisive about New York, saying it's a nightmare or
that it's empty, or a has-been," said Jill Kargman, a writer, Upper East Side resident
and daughter of the former chairman of Chanel who has socialized at events with the
couple in the past. "No one here is going to forget that. To even come back here after
everything he's said, it's not going to work."
In the days before they were denizens of the White House, Kushner and Trump
inhabited a rarified slice of New York society.
They frequented the Met Gala, she in a strapless royal blue gown one year and a
backless scarlet jumpsuit the next, and the Vanity Fair party for the Tribeca Film
Festival. She made the rounds at fashion events, attending Carolina Herrera runway
shows, a Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts celebration for Italian designer
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Valentino and the Glamour Women of the Year Awards.
Now, though, they may not like what they find if they return.
Trump's eldest children split on his path
forward
A glimpse of what likely awaits them was
on display in Times Square last month
where the anti-Trump Lincoln Project
took out ad space on a pair of Times
Square billboards showing their smiling
faces alongside coronavirus death
statistics and an illustration of body
bags. When the couple threatened to file
a lawsuit, the group also placed the image on a barge to circle Mar-a-Lago and on trucks
that circled Trump Tower, according to tweets from the project co-founder.
New York isn't the only place to call home, of course. While the couple has been tight-
lipped about where they intend to reside post-White House, they have kept their
sprawling Upper East Side apartment, an East Wing official said, and they are eyeing
the possibility of spending more time in New Jersey, according to a source familiar with
the couple's thinking.
Two sources who have worked with the couple believe they may end up in Florida,
specifically the Palm Beach area. Trump has accumulated a number of acquaintances in
the state, both socially and politically, and in recent months she visited Florida at least
five times, hosting campaign events in Republican areas such as Sarasota, but also
making appearances in Miami. A Florida home-base would not only provide Trump a
platform should she eye a future political career there, and it would also keep the couple
clear of facing New York.
Mar-a-Lago is not an option for their permanent residence, however, according to a
source with knowledge of the family dynamics. Though Ivanka Trump has a private
guest house there, Mar-a-Lago is the preferred home of the first lady and she and the
President's daughter have a frosty relationship.
Washington, meanwhile, may no longer hold much appeal. "They only know the DC of
being in power," said one senior Republican. "Wait until they realize no one is taking
their calls."
Indeed, inside the White House, according to sources, the expectation is high for them
to return to Manhattan -- even if it means an inhospitable homecoming for the pair.
For one thing, either may decide to return to their respective family businesses, where
they each worked before the White House. Representatives for Ivanka Trump and
Kushner Companies did not respond to requests for comment on this story. A
spokesperson for the Trump Organization referred calls to the White House.
A White House official said of Kushner that "there are a wealth of opportunities for him
to explore," pointing to his involvement in criminal justice reform and the Olympics,
among other matters. The official added, "There will be plenty of available
opportunities, and right now it's premature to speculate."

Financial obligations could be a factor

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Financial obligations could be a factor
Kushner was previously CEO of Kushner Companies, the real-estate firm founded by his
father, Charles Kushner. The company is largely family-run, in part because the
Kushners prefer it that way, according to a person familiar with his thinking.
Charles Kushner is likely to expect his son to return to the business, this person said,
and with the relationships Jared Kushner has established in recent years with leaders of
deep-pocketed Middle Eastern countries, including Saudi Arabia, he could potentially
leverage those connections going forward in the family business or other business
ventures.
Trump, too, left her position at the Trump Organization upon moving to Washington,
but she retained passive stakes in the business. She receives fixed guaranteed payments
for some of her assets as well as a financial interest in the Trump International Hotel
Washington, DC, for which she played a key role in closing the deal, and which is home
to the first "Spa by Ivanka Trump." She reported $3.9 million in income from the hotel
in 2019.
And though she has sought to position herself as a sunny, polished figure who is distinct
from her father's brash ways, she is valued at the company for her ability to channel his
whims and preferences.
Several months before the 2016 opening of the DC hotel, she made an impression with
staff by comparing three identical-looking shades of gold painted on the ornate filigree
atop one of the arched doorways in the hotel's ballroom and declaring one the obvious
choice for a Trump property.
While the couple remains wealthy, their financial obligations could factor into their
post-White House decision making.
While working at the White House, Kushner has taken out two loans from Bank of
America, one in 2017 and one in 2019, each ranging between $5 million and $25
million, according to his financial disclosure form. Both loans, which were taken out
jointly with limited liability companies, are due in 2022.
The family business, which owns residential properties with hundreds of tenants, will
also likely face challenges from the pending housing crisis. One $285 million loan,
taken out in 2016 for a Times Square retail complex, is underwater after one tenant filed
for bankruptcy, according to TreppWire, a real estate data analytics firm.
For her part, Trump shut down her namesake fashion brand in 2018, and while the
apparel line had performed well the year of the election, it suffered in the aftermath as
anti-Trump boycotts of her line took hold.
The legal reckoning awaiting Donald
Trump if he loses the election
And they face legal headaches back in
New York, where Trump is being sued in
federal court, along with her father and
two eldest brothers, for allegedly
collaborating with a fraudulent marketing
scheme to prey on vulnerable and
financially struggling investors, claims
they have denied.
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Kushner, too, has faced his share of legal concerns back home, where Brooklyn federal
prosecutors were examining his family company's use of an investment-for-
immigration program, although that probe doesn't appear to have been active in about
two years.

Political ambitions

Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner listen as President Donald Trump speaks at a
campaign rally at Atlantic Aviation on September 22, 2020 in Moon Township,
Pennsylvania. (Photo by Jeff Swensen/Getty Images)
One wild card is whether Trump's taste for politics will stick as she has gotten a sense of
her power to generate big political dollars. Since August, she headlined 38 events in
multiple states and hosted nine fundraisers, garnering more than $35 million for her
father's campaign.
She has offered an alternative to the massive crowds, chants of "lock her up" and
throngs disco-dancing to "YMCA" at her father's rallies. At political events, she often
sticks to speaking about matters she feels her father has succeeded in advancing,
including job growth, economic stability, family tax credit and entrepreneurship.
Trump, however, recognizes that her future -- now more than ever -- is tied to her
father, said a person familiar with the matter, adding that she came into the White
House as Kushner, but now she has gone "Full MAGA."
Several people told CNN in recent months that Trump is considering her own potential
political future, which may be driving the more nuanced positions she has taken in
contrast to with her brothers' strident remarks on matters like immigration and, more
recently, alleged voter fraud.
Since Election Day, the couple has kept a low profile, although a White House official
tells CNN that both Trump and Kushner have been working at the White House.
Kushner, CNN has reported, has been part of the team tasked with fomenting a legal
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path forward for Trump's baseless fight against the outcome of the election, while
privately attempting to cajole the President into accepting his inevitable loss.
While ballots were still being tabulated in battleground states, three days after Election
Day, Trump tweeted that legal votes should be counted, but "every illegally cast vote
should not."
But she added, "This is not a partisan statement," noting, "free and fair elections are the
foundation of our democracy."
Earlier this week, she appeared to validate the vote counting that has continued well
past Election Day by celebrating media organizations declaring that the President won
in Alaska after a flurry of outstanding ballots were counted.
It struck a softer tone than her father's nonstop baseless railing against what he has
called a "fraud" and "hoax" voting process.

Returning to a changed social circuit

Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner,
White House Senior Advisers, walk to
Air Force One prior to departure with US
President Donald Trump and first lady
Melania Trump from Joint Base
Andrews in Maryland, October 30, 2018,
as they travel to Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania, following the shooting at
the Tree of Life Synagogue. (Photo by
SAUL LOEB / AFP, Getty Images)
Despite their presence at Manhattan society events pre-White House, including parties
thrown by the Kushner family-owned New York Observer newspaper, which drew the
likes of Rupert Murdoch, Padma Lakshmi, Chuck Close, Katie Couric and Michael
Bloomberg, the two have never been known to maintain an extensive circle of friends in
New York, people familiar with the matter said, instead spending much of their free
time with family and acquaintances from their Orthodox Jewish community.
And while Kushner is close with his brother, Joshua Kushner, as well as a friend from
Harvard, financier Nitin Saigal, and Trump remains friendly with Murdoch's ex-wife
Wendi Deng, according to people familiar with the matter, some of their other New
York pals have hit hurdles in recent years.
Kushner's friend Adam Neumann resigned as CEO amid disarray at the company he
founded, WeWork. And Ken Kurson, a close friend of the couple, was arrested on
federal cyberstalking charges in late October.
Outside of their immediate social circle, they are unlikely to receive the types of
invitations they scored pre-White House. Vogue Editor-in-Chief and Condé Nast
Artistic Director Anna Wintour has made no secret of her distaste for the President and
his politics, and Wintour's preferences determine invitations to the Met Gala.
Trump's currency as a glossy fashion magazine feature star -- which she last flaunted in
Harper's Bazaar in September 2016, during the thick of the campaign, wearing a $6,990
Carolina Herrera gown while perched on a ladder overlooking the Manhattan skyline --
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has declined as well.
One former editor at a prestigious magazine who remains an in demand stylist said
Trump will struggle with reentering the fashion orbit. "The fashion industry is a very
liberal, Democratic leaning group," he said, "and I just don't see them welcoming them
back -- professionally or socially -- with open arms."
New York tabloids, which helped propel the President to fame and chronicled the social
rise of his children broke in recent days from promoting the administration's agenda,
with even the New York Post urging the President to end his "stolen election"
complaints.
Their New York neighbors, meanwhile, may have similar gripes. Co-inhabitants of their
apartment complex include the President's former -- and now estranged -- lawyer
Michael Cohen and his daughter Samantha, who has described Trump snubbing her in
their building's lobby, despite having come over to dine on her dad's "famous" lasagna.
"One time she told on me after she saw me smoking cigarettes outside of our building,"
Samantha Cohen told Vanity Fair. "It was so lame."
They may find some support close to home -- a US Secret Service source said the two
have been a favored assignment because they are "very good to their detail." They get to
know them, he said, and ask after their families.
Other employees on the family payroll say they are caring employers. One nanny (there
have been up to three employed at once, per a source familiar) has been with them for
several years, and "is treated like a member of the family," said a hair stylist who
counted Trump as a client and who often witnessed her interactions with others.
But New Yorkers broadly aren't exactly aligned with the couple's political leanings. In
2016, about 9 out of 10 Manhattanites voted for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
With more than 60% of the state's votes counted as of Thursday night, Biden is
projected to win Manhattan by a similar margin.
That may portend reactions like the one Kargman said she could foresee displaying if
she encounters Trump back in Manhattan.
"I would yell 'Shame!' at her, like to Cersei Lannister in 'Game of Thrones,'" Kargman
said. "Just yell, 'shame, shame, shame,' at her, in that same rhythmic pattern."
CORRECTION: This story has been corrected to reflect that billboard images of Jared
Kushner and Ivanka Trump were not removed but also placed on a barge and trucks.

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