Skip to main content
Sunday, November 15, 2026Nov 15

Kushner, Ivanka Trump face ethical land mines ahead

FILE - In this March 17, 2017, file photo, senior adviser Jared Kushner and his wife Ivanka Trump arrive for news conference with President Donald Trump and German Chancellor Angela Merkel in the East Room of the White House in Washington. Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump can help shape foreign and domestic policies. They’ve also built a business empire worth as much as $740 million that has ties around the world, newly released financial disclosures show. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais, file)
FILE - In this March 17, 2017, file photo, senior adviser Jared Kushner and his wife Ivanka Trump arrive for news conference with President Donald Trump and German Chancellor Angela Merkel in the East Room of the White House in Washington. Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump can help shape foreign and domestic policies. They’ve also built a business empire worth as much as $740 million that has ties around the world, newly released financial disclosures show. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais, file)

WASHINGTON (AP) – Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump, presidential relatives with powerful White House jobs, can help shape America’s foreign and domestic policies.

They’ve also built a business empire worth as much as $740 million that has ties around the world, newly released financial disclosures show.

What happens when their government and private sector worlds collide?

Like other federal employees, the daughter and son-in-law of the president are required to adhere to transparency and ethics rules, and by law they cannot take any action in their government positions that affects their individual financial holdings.

New disclosures of the breadth and tangle of Kushner’s financial holdings demonstrate why determining whether either White House adviser is violating the rules is no simple question. If they help the president on tax reform, trade policy or banking regulations, the couple is likely to face a steady stream of ethics challenges and calls for recusal, forcing them to balance their desire to work on those issues against the political impact that negative attention may bring to the president – and themselves.