Ivanka Trump has stood by her father’s side her whole professional life, whether as a fellow judge on The Apprentice or as a colleague in board meetings. She introduced him at his official campaign launch, and now that he’s the President of the United States, she has an unpaid role as his official assistant. What characterizes their particularly special father-daughter bond? Both Ivanka and Donald have explained it along the way to the White House.
By Red Star Magazine
The apple didn't fall far from the 58 story tree
Ivanka transferred to her father's alma mater for college.
Though she started out at Georgetown University in D.C., Ivanka transferred to the University of Pennsylvania's famed Wharton School to study business after her sophomore year (she graduated in 2004). Donald graduated from Wharton in 1968.
Donald would halt meetings if she called as a kid.
Ivanka has shared that Donald would always have his assistants and secretaries patch her through when she called him at work, at which time he would pause his meetings, put her on speaker phone, and then ask her to share her grades and other recent achievements with his colleagues
Still, Donald says he refused to prioritize his children over his work.
"The hardest thing for me about raising kids has been finding the time," Donald has said. "I know friends who leave their business so they can spend more time with their children, and I say, 'Gimme a break!'"
Ivanka shares some of her father's mannerisms and style of speaking
At least, she thinks so. "I'm slowly morphing into him," Ivanka joked when David Letterman observed the similarities in their voices when she appeared on his show in 2007.
Ivanka believes her parents' divorce bonded her with her father.
Donald and his first wife Ivana had an explosive divorce in the early '90s due to his affair with Marla Maples, whom he later married. "Bizarrely, it also made us closer to Dad," Ivanka said in 2004. "Every morning before school, we'd go downstairs and give him a hug and a kiss. We didn't take his presence for granted anymore."
Donald raised Ivanka to be very competitive.
We were sort of bred to be competitive," Ivanka has said. "Dad encourages it. I remember skiing with him and we were racing. I was ahead, and he reached his ski pole out and pulled me back."
Donald has been open about his finances with Ivanka since she was a child.
In an oft-quoted interview for the documentary Born Rich, Ivanka recalled how her father Donald once pointed to a homeless man while they were walking down Fifth Avenue of Manhattan. "I remember my father pointing to him and saying, 'You know, that guy has $8 billion more than me,' because he was in such extreme debt," she said. She was 8 or 9 at the time
Donald was very strict about drinking or partying when Ivanka was younger.
"I've never been interested in being a wild party girl, an It girl. My dad is very strict," Ivanka has said. "My dad feels very adamantly about no drugs, no drinking, no smoking, because his brother died of alcoholism, which is a horrible, horrible thing."
Donald wasn't the snuggliest dad.
He's not the kind of father who would 'Choo-choo, goo-goo, noo-noo,'" his ex Ivana has said. "He would love [his kids], he would kiss them and hold them, but then he would give [them] to me because he had no idea what to do."
Donald hates when Ivanka vacations anywhere other than Mar-a-Lago
His children joked in a 2004 interview that he gets territorial about resorts that aren't Trump-branded. "I just came back from Hawaii two weeks ago and that was exactly his reaction," Ivanka said. "'Why don't you just go to Palm Beach? We have Mar-a-Lago!'"
Ivanka named her first son after Donald's dad.
They'd both love to golf.
Donald owns courses all around the world and has spent much of his presidential downtime thus far on the green. His daughter is no slouch either: she once proudly demonstrated her ability to putt in heels.
Ivanka thinks she inherited the real-estate gene from her father
She toured construction sites with him as a child, learning "this love of building, of tangible things, of the beauty of creating something on a larger scale," as she put it. "Creating something that is lasting and impactful excites me."
Ivanka says both she and her father are feminists.
He 100 percent believes in equality of gender, so, yes, absolutely — socially, politically, and economically," Ivanka said in 2016 regarding whether she would label her dad with the f-word.
Donald gave a pretty crappy speech at Ivanka's wedding
An attendee at the Kushner-Trump nuptials in 2009 told Esquire that Donald "gave the most pathetic, lame, embarrassing speech I've heard in a long time."
Donald has said he would absolutely fire Ivanka.
Yes, their relationship is warm and fuzzy, but he's still a businessman. "Not only would I fire them, but I would fire them like a dog," Donald once said in an interview, prompting Ivanka to call him and say, "I'm not shocked, but did you have to say like a dog? I don't even know what that means!"
Donald embarrasses Ivanka regularly.
There are definitely times where I'm like, did you have to say that, Dad?" she told Oprah in 2009, covering her face with her hands.