• Home
  • Latest
  • Fortune 500
  • Finance
  • Tech
  • Leadership
  • Lifestyle
  • Rankings
  • Multimedia

Trendingnow

1

Microsoft AI chief gives it 18 months—for all white-collar work to be automated by AI

2

Former top Russian official admits the country is over Putin and can 'imagine a future without him' — even elites bail as Kremlin seizes their assets 

3

Despite having a $165 million net worth, Scarlett Johansson says work-life balance doesn’t exist—and the first step to success is admitting that

1

Microsoft AI chief gives it 18 months—for all white-collar work to be automated by AI

2

Former top Russian official admits the country is over Putin and can 'imagine a future without him' — even elites bail as Kremlin seizes their assets 

3

Despite having a $165 million net worth, Scarlett Johansson says work-life balance doesn’t exist—and the first step to success is admitting that
MPWIvanka Trump

‘Actions Speak Louder Than Words.’ Ivanka Trump Is Walking a Fine Line on Women’s Issues

Alana Abramson
By
Alana Abramson
Alana Abramson
Down Arrow Button Icon
Alana Abramson
By
Alana Abramson
Alana Abramson
Down Arrow Button Icon
April 17, 2017, 8:00 AM ET

Shortly after President Donald Trump took office, his daughter Ivanka Trump met with the president of Planned Parenthood.

It was an awkward situation for both. On the campaign trail, the elder Trump had suggested that women should be punished for receiving abortions (a statement he then retracted) and called for defunding Planned Parenthood if it continued providing abortions. For her part, Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards had been a staunch supporter of Hillary Clinton during the election, and once referred to one of Ivanka Trump’s pet projects, a proposal on maternity leave, as “half-baked.”

But the two made a good-faith effort to connect, with a Planned Parenthood spokesperson describing the meeting as “cordial and informative.”

A little over two months later, Vice President Mike Pence cast a tie-breaking vote in the Senate on a bill that allows states to withhold federal funding from Planned Parenthood and other organizations that provide abortion. On April 13, President Trump signed the bill into law. The First Daughter was spotted skiing in Canada that day, during the Jewish holiday of Passover.

On social media, the news was greeted by many Planned Parenthood supporters with a “Thanks, Ivanka,” an increasingly common way for liberals to express their displeasure with the First Daughter. “The Planned Parenthood defunding is exactly the reason we don’t trust Ivanka’s ‘influence’ and never will,” liberal pundit Zerlina Maxwell said on Twitter.

The Planned Parenthood outreach was emblematic of the tricky position that Ivanka Trump is in as First Daughter. As Trump’s most visible emissary on women’s issues, it remains to be seen if she can bridge the considerable partisan divide between the White House and liberals on abortion, equal pay, paid parental leave and other matters. So far it’s looking less than likely, as liberal groups and their allies in government feel increasingly marginalized and frustrated with the Trump Administration. And it’s the First Daughter who frequently bears the brunt of the backlash against actions her father has taken.

When President Trump defended Fox News host Bill O’Reilly in the face of sexual harassment charges, California Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters criticized the First Daughter.

“Where is Ivanka?” Waters asked in an interview. “I think she either advised him wrong or is absent.”

As Richards, who has called Ivanka’s silence “deafening,” put it pointedly at the Women in the World Summit earlier this month: “Anyone who works in this White House is responsible for addressing why women are in the crosshairs of basically every single policy that we’ve seen out of this administration.”

The White House declined to comment on the record for this article. In a recent interview on CBS This Morning, Ivanka Trump attempted to deflect the criticism, arguing that she works behind the scenes. “Where I disagree with my father, he knows it,” she said.

The role of First Daughter has always been a challenging one — just ask Chelsea Clinton, the Bush twins or the Obama daughters how they felt about the public scrutiny. But Ivanka Trump is older than most first children, with her own public image to maintain and a brand that is inescapably linked to her father’s.

Before Donald Trump got into politics, Ivanka Trump served as an executive in the family business and had cameos on The Apprentice while running her own fashion line. When he ran for President, she vouched for his advocacy of women in the workforce and stood onstage with him while he announced proposals for affordable childcare. She gave a well-received primetime speech on women’s issues at the Republican National Convention, where she described herself as neither “categorically Republican or Democrat.” And after serving as an informal adviser, she joined the White House staff in late March.

“We’ve never seen a presidential daughter involved in policy like this before,” Kate Anderson Brower, the author of First Women: The Grace and Power of America’s Modern First Ladies, said in an email. “Some people might find it refreshing to see an intelligent woman in her mid-thirties being given a seat at the table, regardless of why or how.”

Anderson Brower also noted the “fine line” Ivanka Trump has to walk “while trying to draw her father’s attention to pursue issues like childcare and global warming and while still keeping a seat at the table.”

Since the election, Ivanka Trump has been involved in some high-profile events while carefully staking out her own moderate public positions. She’s met with former Vice President Al Gore to discuss climate change, attended a summit on women entrepreneurs with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, met with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Chancellor Angela Merkel, and attended a White House panel on increasing the number of women in STEM fields. Later this month, she will attend the Women’s 20 summit in Germany.

The White House has touted these meetings to showcase her advocacy, and she officially joined the White House staff as a government employee late last month.

“So far we haven’t seen actual policies that show that she’s being effective pushing her agenda yet,” said Anderson Brower. “Look at who is head of the EPA,” she added, referring to Scott Pruitt, a longtime EPA antagonist who has questioned the overwhelming scientific consensus of man-made climate change and now runs the agency he once sued frequently.

On some of her father’s more controversial comments — on issues like his court-hobbled travel ban or building a wall on the border with Mexico — Ivanka Trump has refrained from public comment. That silence has drawn fierce criticism from Trump opponents. A viral Saturday Night Live sketch argued the silence makes her “complicit,” while the actress who portrayed her in the sketch, Scarlett Johansson, argued that she needs to speak up more.

“If you take a job as a public advocate, then you must advocate publicly,” Johansson said at the Women in the World Summit.

Her public silence has included times when President Trump has taken actions contrary to his daughter’s stated goals. While Ivanka Trump has touted equal pay for women, posting a graph depicting the gender wage gap on her Instagram feed and noting her excitement about fighting for this goal on Equal Pay Day, her father signed an executive order rescinding an Obama Administration requirement that federal contractors be more transparent about salaries.

“Obviously we think it’s a positive thing that she has talked about the importance of equal pay and paid family leave; certainly that is a good first step,” said Emily Martin, a lawyer who handles workplace issues for the National Women’s Law Center. “What we haven’t heard in regards to equal pay is any sort of policy proposal or any sort of discussion what she feels, [or] what President Trump feels.”

Views of Ivanka Trump are also divided along partisan lines in Congress. In February, she held a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House with a small group of female lawmakers to discuss paid leave and her childcare tax proposal. Nebraska Republican Sen. Deb Fischer, who was among the attendees at that meeting and introduced the Workplace Advancement Act, which would prevent punishment for employees wanting to know or share information about salaries, said she is “thrilled” to have Ivanka Trump working on this issue.

“Working with Ivanka is really a benefit for us,” Fischer said. “It’s exciting because she brings a lot of attention to this issue. And to have the White House step up and use its platform will bring in a lot of outside groups, too.”

But Washington Democratic Sen. Patty Murray, who co-sponsored the Paycheck Fairness Act, which would strengthen the provisions of the 1963 Equal Pay Act, was less enthusiastic. Murray was not invited to the meeting in the Roosevelt Room, an official in her office confirmed, and there has been no contact between Murray and Trump on the issue of equal pay. The same goes for Connecticut Democratic Rep. Rosa DeLauro, who re-introduced the Paycheck Fairness Act in Congress this year, as she has done for two decades.

“If the Trump Administration is serious about supporting women and equal pay, they have a lot of work to do to show women across the country they will stand up and fight for meaningful equal pay legislation,” Murray said in a statement to Fortune. “For the millions of women being paid less than their male coworkers, actions speak louder than words.”

About the Author
Alana Abramson
By Alana Abramson
See full bioRight Arrow Button Icon

Latest in MPW

Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025

Most Popular

Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Fortune Secondary Logo
Rankings
  • 100 Best Companies
  • Fortune 500
  • Global 500
  • Fortune 500 Europe
  • Most Powerful Women
  • World's Most Admired Companies
  • See All Rankings
  • Lists Calendar
Sections
  • Finance
  • Fortune Crypto
  • Features
  • Leadership
  • Health
  • Commentary
  • Success
  • Retail
  • Mpw
  • Tech
  • Lifestyle
  • CEO Initiative
  • Asia
  • Politics
  • Conferences
  • Europe
  • Newsletters
  • Personal Finance
  • Environment
  • Magazine
  • Education
Customer Support
  • Frequently Asked Questions
  • Customer Service Portal
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms Of Use
  • Single Issues For Purchase
  • International Print
Commercial Services
  • Advertising
  • Fortune Brand Studio
  • Fortune Analytics
  • Fortune Conferences
  • Business Development
  • Group Subscriptions
About Us
  • About Us
  • Press Center
  • Work At Fortune
  • Terms And Conditions
  • Site Map
  • About Us
  • Press Center
  • Work At Fortune
  • Terms And Conditions
  • Site Map
  • Facebook icon
  • Twitter icon
  • LinkedIn icon
  • Instagram icon
  • Pinterest icon

Latest in MPW

‘Be delusional enough to call yourself something the world hasn’t called you yet’: What powerful women told the class of 2026
NewslettersMPW Daily
‘Be delusional enough to call yourself something the world hasn’t called you yet’: What powerful women told the class of 2026
By Sydney LakeMay 14, 2026
3 days ago
Mrs. Dow Jones on what women get wrong about money
NewslettersMPW Daily
Mrs. Dow Jones on what women get wrong about money
By Sydney LakeMay 13, 2026
4 days ago
lamb
Arts & EntertainmentObituary
Joni Lamb, founder of one of the largest Christian TV networks in the world, dies at 65
By John Seewer and The Associated PressMay 11, 2026
5 days ago
TIAA CEO Thasunda Brown Duckett’s 3 rules for Gen Z entering the workforce: Adapt, lean in, and build a bigger table
SuccessGen Z
TIAA CEO Thasunda Brown Duckett’s 3 rules for Gen Z entering the workforce: Adapt, lean in, and build a bigger table
By Sydney LakeMay 11, 2026
6 days ago
nicole
MPWWealth
Meet Goldman’s athlete whisperer: the woman who stands guard against $1 billion of fraud targeting sports fortunes
By Nick LichtenbergMay 10, 2026
7 days ago
Young man working on laptop with headphones in modern coffeeshop
Future of Workskills gap
AI generated identical résumés for a man and a woman: Hers was more likely to be labeled ‘weak,’ while his got a 97% approval rating
By Eleanor PringleMay 10, 2026
7 days ago

Most Popular

Microsoft AI chief gives it 18 months—for all white-collar work to be automated by AI
AI
Microsoft AI chief gives it 18 months—for all white-collar work to be automated by AI
By Jake AngeloMay 16, 2026
17 hours ago
Former top Russian official admits the country is over Putin and can 'imagine a future without him' — even elites bail as Kremlin seizes their assets 
Politics
Former top Russian official admits the country is over Putin and can 'imagine a future without him' — even elites bail as Kremlin seizes their assets 
By Jason MaMay 16, 2026
7 hours ago
Despite having a $165 million net worth, Scarlett Johansson says work-life balance doesn’t exist—and the first step to success is admitting that
Success
Despite having a $165 million net worth, Scarlett Johansson says work-life balance doesn’t exist—and the first step to success is admitting that
By Preston ForeMay 13, 2026
4 days ago
Meet the 20-year-old CEO who launched a company in high school to solve Gen Z's entry-level job crisis
Future of Work
Meet the 20-year-old CEO who launched a company in high school to solve Gen Z's entry-level job crisis
By Jake AngeloMay 16, 2026
21 hours ago
The Bezos family just donated $100 million to help achieve one of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s top campaign promises
Politics
The Bezos family just donated $100 million to help achieve one of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s top campaign promises
By Jake AngeloMay 12, 2026
4 days ago
‘You’re not a hero, you’re a liability’: Shark Tank’s Kevin O’Leary warns Gen Z founders to stop glorifying hustle culture
Future of Work
‘You’re not a hero, you’re a liability’: Shark Tank’s Kevin O’Leary warns Gen Z founders to stop glorifying hustle culture
By Jacqueline MunisMay 16, 2026
17 hours ago

© 2026 Fortune Media IP Limited. All Rights Reserved. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy | CA Notice at Collection and Privacy Notice | Do Not Sell/Share My Personal Information
FORTUNE is a trademark of Fortune Media IP Limited, registered in the U.S. and other countries. FORTUNE may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. Offers may be subject to change without notice.