As investigators target her husband and father, Ivanka Trump always seems to slide under the radar.

Why? An Intercept columnist wants to know. And in a new column, Hannah Seligson lays out connections between Ivanka and some of the worst deeds in her father’s administration, and makes the case that “sexism and gender stereotypes have also worked in her favor.”

ADVERTISEMENT

“The press often spins events in Ivanka’s favor,” Seligson writes, listing the Charlottesville and transgender military ban debacles as instances in which Ivanka successfully telegraphed disagreement with her father through the press to distance herself.

But, as a top advisor to her father, Ivanka has also been around many of Trump’s most scandalous activities. For example, she was in the conversation where her father decided to lie about the purpose of her brother’s meeting with Russians, which he scheduled because he was promised dirt on Hillary Clinton. She encouraged her father to fire FBI director James Comey. She stood by disgraced Gen. Michael Flynn.

Ivanka is, “the ghost” of the Russian investigation, Seligson says: “She is connected, either directly or tangentially, to events at the heart of the probe, yet all but invisible to the public.”

The reason Ivanka can get away with this, the column argues, is that she so carefully curates her image as a female entrepreneur and mom. Specifically, she has such a stylish Instagram feed that the media doesn’t seem to take her seriously.

“It’s a persona that renders the media establishment and broader public largely incapable of considering that she might be a key player in the Trump-Russia narrative,” the column argues. Read it here.