Jerusalem Post 50 Most Influential Jews: Number 4 - Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner

The couple are considered two of the most important advisers to Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.

By MICHAEL WILNER
Updated: OCTOBER 3, 2016 07:26
Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner (photo credit: REUTERS)
Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner
(photo credit: REUTERS)
Two of the most important figures in the 2016 US presidential campaign had no previous political experience whatsoever before Donald Trump, against all odds, swept to the Republican nomination earlier this year. His darling daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, are considered two of the most important advisers in his famously tight inner circle.
After three years of study, Ivanka converted to Judaism in 2009 to marry Jared, who was raised in a modern Orthodox household. They both observe the Sabbath, leading some to speculate on who approves the elder Trump’s famously rambunctious Twitter messages after sundown on Friday nights.
“We’re pretty observant, more than some, less than others. I just feel like it’s such an intimate thing for us,” Ivanka told Vogue last year.
“It’s been such a great life decision for me. I am very modern, but I’m also a very traditional person, and I think that’s an interesting juxtaposition in how I was raised as well. I really find that with Judaism, it creates an amazing blueprint for family connectivity.”
The co-author of Donald Trump’s speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in March, Kushner has taken to defending Trump from attacks that he is antisemitic or that he fosters antisemitism.
“My father-in-law is an incredibly loving and tolerant person who has embraced my family and our Judaism since I began dating my wife. His support has been unwavering and from the heart,” Kushner wrote. “I have personally seen him embrace people of all racial and religious backgrounds, at his companies and in his personal life.”
The “caricature that some want to paint as someone who has ‘allowed’ or encouraged intolerance just doesn’t reflect the Donald Trump I know,” he went on.
“The from-the-heart reactions of this man are instinctively pro-Jewish and pro-Israel,” he added.