Advertisement

Ivanka Trump to get office in White House

By Andrew V. Pestano
Ivanka Trump (R) and her husband, White House senior adviser to the president for strategic planning Jared Kushner, walk down the West Wing Colonnade following a bilateral meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on February 10 in the White House. Trump will receive an office in the White House's West Wing, where she will serve as her father's "eyes and ears," her lawyer said. Pool photo by Chip Somodevilla/UPI
Ivanka Trump (R) and her husband, White House senior adviser to the president for strategic planning Jared Kushner, walk down the West Wing Colonnade following a bilateral meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on February 10 in the White House. Trump will receive an office in the White House's West Wing, where she will serve as her father's "eyes and ears," her lawyer said. Pool photo by Chip Somodevilla/UPI | License Photo

March 21 (UPI) -- Ivanka Trump will have an office in the White House's West Wing but will not be a government employee, an official from President Donald Trump's administration said.

Trump, who still owns a fashion and jewelry brand, and is publishing a book due out in May, will work in an office next to Donald Trump's senior adviser, Dina Powell, who was recently promoted to a National Security Council position.

Advertisement

The official said Ivanka Trump, who is in the process of obtaining a security clearance and will receive government-issued communications devices this week, would have access to classified information.

Jamie Gorelick, Ivanka Trump's lawyer, told Politico the president's daughter is not being sworn in, will hold no official position and is not receiving a salary. Her role will be to serve as her father's "eyes and ears" while providing broad-ranging service not limited to women's empowerment issues.

Gorelick said Ivanka Trump, who would be joining her husband senior adviser to the president, Jared Kushner, will follow the same ethics and records retention rules that apply to government employees.

Advertisement

"Having an adult child of the president who is actively engaged in the work of the administration is new ground," Gorelick said Monday. "Our view is that the conservative approach is for Ivanka to voluntarily comply with the rules that would apply if she were a government employee, even though she is not."

"I will continue to offer my father my candid advice and counsel, as I have for my entire life," Ivanka Trump said in a statement. "While there is no modern precedent for an adult child of the president, I will voluntarily follow all of the ethics rules placed on government employees."

Norm Eisen, the former ethics czar in former President Barack Obama's administration, suggested Trump needs to be formally subjected to the ethics rules -- not voluntarily.

"They're not saying she's going to voluntarily subject herself to ethics rules to be nice," Eisen said. "There's recognition that they're in very uncertain territory here. The better thing to do would be to concede she is subject to the rules. It would create some outside accountability, because if she can voluntarily subject herself to the rules, she can voluntarily un-subject herself to the rules."

Advertisement

Latest Headlines