Ivanka Trump, a lifelong beneficiary of rank nepotism and enormous wealth, thinks she knows what average Americans want better than Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY).
Nevermind that the former has never had to work a real day of work because her father managed to wrangle over $400 million from his own father through tax fraud. Nevermind that the latter worked as a bartender before becoming a Congresswoman, giving her direct experience with what it’s like to be part of the American working class.
No, Ivanka wants us to think that she knows best, or at least that appears to be the main takeaway from her latest interview with Fox News.
Axios reports that while the clip was released last night, the full interview is scheduled to be broadcast on Sunday. In it, Ivanka was asked about her father’s reelection and how the performance of the economy and Trump’s anti-socialism messaging will affect the race. Specifically, she was asked about the jobs guarantee in Ocasio-Cortez’s proposed Green New Deal. Ivanka answered as only an insanely rich heiress could.
“I don’t think most Americans, in their heart, want to be given something,” Ivanka said, conveniently leaving out the fact that she’s been given everything her entire life.
“I’ve spent a lot of time traveling around this country over the past four years,” she continued. “People want to work for what they get. So, I think that this idea of a guaranteed minimum is not something most people want,” the First Daughter pontificated.
As usual, her answer is both inane and out of touch. Ignoring the fact that she really has no place speaking for the average American, the content of her response is itself a mess. A jobs guarantee doesn’t mean people wouldn’t have to work. It just means if they need and are able to work they’ll be able to get a job. Such a policy in no way hampers the desire to work that Ivanka mentions. It almost sounds like she’s confusing a jobs guarantee with a universal basic income.
On top of that, her father’s administration refuses to confront the immense hurdle that increased robotic automation and globalization poses to the working classe. As the demand for unskilled labor decreases, people will need some kind of job retraining, jobs guarantee, or universal basic income to offset the evaporation of large sectors of the jobs market. If the GOP won’t even admit there’s a problem to be solved, they can’t be trusted when they discuss the topic.
Regardless of what one thinks of the Green New Deal — and there’s a lot to legitimately criticize in its first draft — it’s the only sweeping suggestion for how to deal with climate change on the table right now. Republicans have no solutions, they refuse to even admit that climate change is real, let alone an existential threat to human civilization. Until they wake up to the truth and embrace the reality of the science they should be ignored and their “opinions” rejected.
Watch the clip below.
Ivanka debuts as admin spokesperson for rugged individualism: "I don't think most Americans want to be given something. People want to work for what they get." pic.twitter.com/RerMUQ7aIj
— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) February 26, 2019
Not surprisingly, Twitter wasn’t exactly kind to Ivanka’s hypocrisy.
— Ken Klippenstein (@kenklippenstein) February 26, 2019
Ivanka Trump gets lucrative annual streams of income, rents and capital gains — $1 million here, $5 million there — from her biz, her husband's biz, and her father's biz that she largely gets for just sitting there. Her public disclosure form: https://t.co/9V53mqN6eS https://t.co/toTByQ3udc
— Tim O'Brien (@TimOBrien) February 26, 2019
I'll listen to Ivanka on this issue when she's worked for minimum wage and tried to live on it. Or when she's been disabled and tried to live on disability. Or when she's worked two jobs and still not been able to afford rent. Until then the trust fund princess can sit down. https://t.co/Ls6UcGH2uU
— Elizabeth Spiers (@espiers) February 26, 2019
Whoa Ivanka comes out in favour of 100% inheritance tax. https://t.co/YOC8ey6Ciq
— Robin Wigglesworth (@RobinWigg) February 26, 2019
Ivanka Trump has been talking about how she doesn’t think there should be living wage jobs because Americans “don’t like to be given things.” Here’s Ivanka describing in her book how she truly lives by this bootstrap-pilling maxim https://t.co/iCfpr3kUlA
— Hadley Freeman (@HadleyFreeman) February 26, 2019
Ivanka Trump attacked Ocasio-Cortez: "This idea of a guaranteed minimum is not something most people want. People want to work for what they get."
Ivanka, who has had every job given to her by her father her entire life, needs to sit this one out.
— Denizcan Grimes (@MrFilmkritik) February 26, 2019
Here is Ivanka Trump's financial disclosure as a White House staffer, full of royalties from dad's businesses. You decide how true a believer she is in working for what you get. https://t.co/LxxuYUDD6n
— Anand Giridharadas (@AnandWrites) February 26, 2019
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