Donald Trump’s estranged niece joined MSNBC over the weekend to respond to the January 6 committee’s request for testimony from her cousin, Ivanka Trump, and predicted that the issue could very well be the wedge that drives apart the former president and his eldest daughter.
Mary Trump told MSNBC’s Alex Witt that the 40-year-old former White House adviser was weighing her options and deciding where her loyalties should lie as the committee requests information from her about the goings-on in the White House while the riot on Capitol Hill unfolded.
“She knows she has to come down on the right side of things. Or, she'll continue to stay her father's ally, and have to see how that plays out,” Ms Trump said of her cousin. She added: “[Ivanka’s] in a very bad situation because she must understand that if Donald feels it's necessary, he will stop protecting her.”
If Ivanka cooperates fully with the committee and gives a damning account of what transpired in the White House while lawmakers and other allies of the president were pleading for aid or any kind of response from the president, Mary Trump said, her uncle will turn on his daughter.
“Donald will throw anybody under the bus if he believes it's in his best interest to do so. If he believes it'll help play out the clock, if he believes that it will help him avoid accountability, that's all he cares about,” she claimed.
Her remarks come after Mr Trump issued one of his angriest statements yet about the January 6 committee following its request for testimony from Ivanka Trump.
The former president accused Democrats of targeting his “children”, although Ms Trump is an adult and had the unique role of White House adviser along with her husband Jared Kushner, who joined the administration in 2017.
“It's a disgrace, what's going on. They're using these things to try and get people's minds off how incompetently our country is being run. And they don't care. They'll go after children,” he said in an interview with the right-leaning Washington Examiner over the weekend.
The two were some of the longest-serving senior staff at a White House that saw remarkable turnover of personnel over four years of Mr Trump’s presidency, and Ms Trump in particular is now of interest to the committee after it was revealed that White House staffers were personally appealing to her to convince her father to act as rioters chanted “hang Mike Pence”, fought with members of law enforcement, and hunted for members of Congress on Capitol Hill.
Republicans have largely attempted to obstruct the committee’s efforts through a variety of legal challenges, but the president’s daughter is expected to cooperate with the committee’s requests for testimony according to panel members.
Ivanka Trump issued a statement after the committee’s request became public, seeking to distance the former White House aide from a rally that occurred on the grounds of the Ellipse near the White House on January 6; her father famously told his supporters to “fight like hell” at the event minutes before the Capitol was attacked.
“Ivanka Trump just learned that the January 6 Committee issued a public letter asking her to appear. As the Committee already knows, Ivanka did not speak at the January 6 rally,” said a spokesperson for Ms Trump.
“As she publicly stated that day at 3:15pm, ‘any security breach or disrespect to our law enforcement is unacceptable. The violence must stop immediately. Please be peaceful,’” the spokesperson added.
