A SURPRISING pair in the White House inner circle could be the key ingredient to keep the President in check.
Donald Trump’s daughter Ivanka and her husband Jared Kushner may have only just moved to Washington, but they’re already exerting considerable influence over some of their father’s policies.
Not to mention, they’re one of the most powerful couples in the world.
While Ms Trump has no official role in the administration, her influence over her father was well-documented over the course of the campaign, and she shaped a number of his key decisions during his run.
Mr Kushner does have a senior role in the White House, and it’s believed he will serve as the antidote to the more conservative members of Mr Trump’s team.
But sources suggest the real estate investor, who, like Mr Trump, has no prior experience in government or politics, is not having the smoothest time adjusting to his new role.
Now the question is: just how successful will the pair’s interventions be?
JARED AND IVANKA THWART ANTI-LGBT MEASURE
Last week, a draft executive order created by the new administration was released, outlining how to roll back Former President Obama’s protections of LGBT rights.
The order, entitled “Establishing a Government-wide Initiative to Respect Religious Freedom”, would have impacted the rights of women and people in the LGBT community on marriage, abortion, contraception and workplace rights.
But shortly after the document was leaked, the White House released a statement pledging to retain LGBT protections implemented by the Obama administration.
“The executive order signed in 2014, which protects employees from anti-LGBTQ workplace discrimination while working for federal contractors, will remain intact at the direction of President Donald J. Trump,” the statement said.
It’s now emerged that Ms Trump and Mr Kushner were behind the backtrack.
The source told Politico the final decision on certain matters goes beyond the President himself, suggesting the more liberal pair does indeed hold sway.
“There are some in Trump’s family that have some views on these things,” the source said. “That’s where the decision is ultimately being made.”
The pair have a record of supporting gay rights, and both move in socially progressive New York circles.
As the New York Times points out, Mr Trump is in a paradoxical position on these issues.
On one hand, the cosmopolitan businessman hails from New York, one of the most progressive states in the US.
Back in the late 90s, he said he was pro-choice on abortion rights, an adamant believer in universal health care and ambivalent on same-sex marriage.
But he now needs to appease the social conservatives who backed him in the November election, and as a result, he’s taken a conservative swing.
Ms Trump and Mr Kushner, on the other hand, aren’t bound by this same pressure.
CAN JARED KUSHNER PUT HIS FOOT DOWN?
Mr Kushner has a crucial role to play in the administration.
He’s said to be part of the administration’s “power centre” — alongside the relatively conservative Steve Bannon, Kellyanne Conway and Reince Priebus.
The Times has described him as “the closest thing to a steadying influence” in the White House, noting his skill at playing down controversies and keeping momentum running high.
He’s often credited as one of the key figures who helped Mr Trump win the election.
In the lead-up to the election, a number of major decisions were said to be the work of Mr Kushner and his wife, including the public ousting of Mr Trump’s former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski last June.
He even supervised Mr Trump’s private phone conversations, according to some reports.
“One aide recalled having a private phone conversation with Trump when he heard Kushner’s voice unexpectedly,” Fortune reported.
“Trump was talking on speaker phone, the aide realised, while Kushner was in the room.”
Mr Trump was thus optimistic about his son-in-law entering the White House.
At his pre-inaugural gala last month, he told wellwishers from the business community: “I have a feeling that Jared’s going to do a great job. He’s going to do a great job. You’ll work with him.”
But in reality, the transition for Mr Kushner has not been easy.
“Kushner appears unable to control both his father-in-law and those around him,” a source told Vanity Fair last week.
As an example, the magazine referred to Mr Kushner’s attempt to broker a meeting between Mr Trump and Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto last month.
Under Mr Kushner’s guidance, Mr Peña Nieto agreed to fly to travel to the White House to discuss issues over which he’d regularly butted heads with Mr Trump.
It all seemed promising. Only it didn’t last. After Mr Peña Nieto restated that Mexico would not pay for Mr Trump’s proposed wall, the President tweeted that it would “be better to cancel the upcoming meeting”.
And just like that, the meeting was done with.
The Times reports that Mr Kushner’s main contender will be Mr Bannon, the hyper-conservative former businessman said to be running the show from behind the scenes.
Whether he can keep the President in check against the conservative former Breitbart editor is another question altogether.
While he’s been present at most major decisions and photo ops, Mr Kushner is a father of three young children, and has been spotted away from the White House at events around his new town.
Mr Bannon has reportedly seized this as an opportunity to push through his more conservative vision for Mr Trump’s administration.
HOW IVANKA IS EMBRACING WASHINGTON
The President’s eldest daughter is proving to be a power player even without an official White House title.
While she’s not technically part of his administration, Ms Trump has been described as her father’s “de facto First Lady”, in place of her stepmother Melania, who has spoken of staying in New York until her son Barron — the President-elect’s youngest child at 10 — finishes his final year at a prestigious primary school.
Just this past week, the first daughter joined President Donald Trump at a policy meeting with business executives and accompanied him on a trip to Delaware’s Dover Air Force Base to honour the returning remains of a U.S. Navy SEAL killed in a raid in Yemen.
She hosted CEOs at her home to talk policy and used her influence behind the scenes at the White House.
In addition to discouraging the LGBTQ rights executive order, she has continued her efforts to gather information about workplace policies for women.
She hosted a dinner at her home for many of the business leaders attending a White House meeting, including the top executives at Wal-Mart, General Motors and Johnson & Johnson, according to people with knowledge of the event.
They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to discuss a private dinner.
Shortly after Mr Trump’s election, Ms Trump and her husband joined the President when he met with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
She also accompanied him to see tech executives from Facebook and Apple and facilitated talks between her dad and Al Gore on climate change action.