Melania Wanted to Keep Ivanka Out of Donald Trump's Inauguration Photos in 2017, Claims Book

Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, the former First Lady's ex-confidante, revealed surprising details about Melania Trump's alleged feud with her stepdaughter, Ivanka Trump, in a memoir titled Melania and Me: The Rise and Fall of My Friendship with the First Lady. An extract from the 2020 book, which was released in New York Magazine, detailed the meticulous measures Wolkoff and, supposedly, Melania took to prevent Ivanka from showing up in pictures of former President Donald Trump's swearing-in ceremony in 2017.

Wolkoff wrote, “We were all exhausted and stressed out. Yes, 'Operation Block Ivanka' was petty. Melania was in on this mission. But in our minds, Ivanka shouldn’t have made herself the center of attention at her father’s inauguration.” As per CNN, in the memoir, Wolkoff also noted that Melania frequently referred to Ivanka as 'Princess' and was determined to keep her stepdaughter out of the East Wing.

"It was Donald's inauguration, not Ivanka's," continued Wolkoff. "But no one was brave enough to tell her that. Melania was not thrilled about Ivanka's steering the schedule and would not allow it. Neither was she happy to hear that Ivanka insisted on walking in the Pennsylvania Avenue parade with her children."

Texting Wolkoff a picture of the previous president, Barack Obama, with his family on his swearing-in day, Ivanka commented, "It's nice to have family with him for this special moment." That is allegedly the moment Melania launched Operation Block Ivanka, according to Wolkoff. For the ceremony, they even went so far as to reorganize the family's standing positions so that the stepmother and stepdaughter weren't adjacent to each other, as stated in the book.

During the presidential transition, Ivanka and her spouse, Jared Kushner, who worked for the White House, are said to have attempted to rent office space in the East Wing because they were always seeking methods to 'control' and subvert Melania. Wolkoff made this accusation as she described Melania and Ivanka's struggle for dominance. According to Wolkoff's account in the book, "Ivanka was... determined to be the First Daughter Lady and to usurp office space out from under Melania; she wanted to be the only visible female Trump on the premises."

Wolkoff also shared in the memoir that Ivanka was using a private email server for official business at the White House. “Ivanka was asking her work contacts at the White House to write to her at her private email—the exact offense the Trumps had lambasted Hillary Clinton for during the general election,” the ex-aide wrote. “Would anyone chant ‘Lock her up!’ about Ivanka’s private server? Doubtful. The email thing was hypocritical, to say the least. But the Trumps made their own rules.”

However, White House representatives dismissed the claims made by Wolkoff's book. “The idea that she was trying to take over the East Wing, I know it’s been written a million times, that doesn’t make it any more true,” said a source familiar with the situation.

"I was there during all of this stuff, and there was absolutely no desire for her to take the East Wing... She wanted to focus on policy in the West Wing. She didn't want to focus on the social aspects," someone from Trump's official team told in People back then. Furthermore, "Ivanka and Mrs. Trump have always shared a close relationship, and that continues today," the former First Lady's spokeswoman, Stephanie Grisham, told Vanity Fair in 2017.

As per the book extract, Wolkoff was brought on board to assist with the 58th Presidential Inauguration and to serve as the First Lady's trusted advisor following Trump's victory in the 2016 election. Melania delegated to Wolkoff the responsibility of hiring personnel, planning events, assisting with speechwriting, and coming up with her first initiatives. However, it seems as though everything collapsed when Wolkoff was used as a 'scapegoat' for inaugural funding issues.

Editor's Note: This article was originally published on 12.17.23. It has since been updated.