On Wednesday morning, a group of House Democrats sent a letter to Andrew McCabe, acting FBI director, asking him to “conduct a review of a potentially serious issue involving First Daughter and Assistant to the President, Ivanka Trump.” The letter, written by Virginia Congressman Don Beyer, asks McCabe to review Ivanka Trump’s security clearance since its application required her to disclose “her own foreign contacts as well as those of her spouse and sibling.”
According to The Hill, the security clearance process asks applicants to disclose any contact with foreign governments, both by the applicant and by close family members, in the past seven years. Some House Democrats, including Jackie Speier, Sheila Jackson Lee, Barbara Lee and Ted Lieu, are asking the FBI whether or not Ivanka disclosed the meeting between her brother, Donald Trump Jr. and husband Jared Kushner with a Russian lawyer. After questions from the New York Times, Trump Jr. confirmed on Twitter that he met with Russian attorney Natalia Veselnitskaya who promised the Trump campaign damaging information on Hillary Clinton. Later reports confirmed that White House adviser Jared Kushner was also in attendance. Kushner also met with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak to, as the Washington Post reported in May, discuss the “possibility of setting up a secret and secure communications channel between Trump’s transition team and the Kremlin.”
Questions about Kushner’s security-clearance application have also been raised. His application has been amended numerous times but, despite the revisions, still omitted contact with foreign governments. The letter from House Democrats raises the specter of Trump Jr. and Kushner, pointing to a “lack of candor,” that has become a pattern in the Trump White House, despite claims of “transparency.” “We are concerned that Ivanka Trump may have engaged in similar deception,” the letter states before flatly asking whether or not Ivanka made disclosures about these meetings in her own application.
Though Ivanka Trump has denied playing an active role in politics, she took President Trump’s place during the recent G20 summit when he stepped out for one-on-one meetings. It’s clear that despite her protestations, Ivanka continues to remain an active participant in the family business of politics.
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