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Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner’s UK trip questioned by confused taxpayers

Ivanka Trump leaves 10 Downing Street after a business meeting on June 4.

Ivanka Trump leaves 10 Downing Street after a business meeting on June 4. Photo: Getty

The relentless presence of Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner at official engagements during Donald Trump’s state visit to the UK has sparked bemusement, confusion and anger among US taxpayers.

Ivanka, 37, and Mr Kushner, 38, both hold senior places in her father’s administration.

Earlier this year it was reported Mr Trump personally intervened in their security clearances – a legal but highly unusual move.

After Mr Trump decided to bring along not just wife Melania Trump but his four adult children – Ivanka, Don Jr, Eric and Tiffany – eyebrows were raised about why he was turning business into a family jaunt on the taxpayers’ dime.

Ivanka Trump Twitter

When a user posted a story saying only Mr and Mrs Trump were invited and the extended family were “palace crashers”, accusations flew of “nepotism at its worst”.

Said another, “Never thought I would say this. I would rather see the Kardashians.”

The UK trip coincided with fallout from a disastrous interview Mr Kushner did with American news site Axios last week, and his rubbing of shoulders with British royals enraged media in his home country.

In a June 4 story headlined “Jared Kushner is profoundly clueless”, CNN asked if Mr Kushner knows “anything relevant” to his White House job.

Does he, the outlet asked, see a purpose “in his life other than elevating himself into ever-higher echelons of wealth and influence?”

If scrutiny about their government roles and whether they’re qualified to do them made Ivanka and her husband at all gun shy, they didn’t show it in London.

Ivanka, particularly, has made the most of her time away from the kids, as documented on her social media feeds, which have been slammed in the past as tone deaf.

There she was at the V&A, taking in some culture. There she was at Westminster Abbey, where Prince Andrew – put in charge of the US delegation – was snapped not meeting Melania’s eyes when they met.

Posing for their gauche family photo before a state dinner at the Buckingham Palace, the Trumps (in determinedly 1980s fashions) were compared on Twitter to the characters in The Beverley Hillbillies.

Ivanka Trump Downing Street

Ivanka does her senior aide thing at 10 Downing Street. Photo: Getty

Ivanka copped flak for her Carolina Herrera bedazzled “shirt dress” – worn to a white-tie occasion where the Duchess of Cambridge was sartorially and diplomatically on the money in a tiara and sash – but again she seemed to shrug it off.

Next morning, she was by her president father’s side for a meeting at 10 Downing Street, then got gussied up again for an official dinner hosted by Donald and Melania Trump for Prince Charles and Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall.

Perhaps the most bizarre, or certainly talked about, appearance Ivanka and Mr Kusher made was when they took up positions at a Buckingham Palace window to watch Monday’s presidential arrival.

While Ivanka’s outfit – which included a rhinestone belt and hat compared to a deflated balloon animal – prompted instant jibes, it was shots of her and her husband staring blankly that caused most consternation.

One Twitter user harked back to the gothic novels of Virginia C Andrews, saying, “I added the photo of Jared and Ivanka looking out the window to a collage of [Andrews’] novel covers and honestly it blends in well.”

Said a second user, “Positively phantasmal.” Added a third, “The Shining only far scarier.”

One weirded-out commentator described Ivanka and Mr Kushner as being “separated from the world and this dimension by a pane of glass and the empty space where their souls used to be”.

In the manner of a hardened diplomat, Ivanka brushed it all off, as demonstrated by her final tweet (complete with US flag emoji) in the evening of June 4: “En route to the Hague!”

Topics: Ivanka Trump
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