Stay up to date with notifications from The Independent

Notifications can be managed in browser preferences.

Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner being considered for an ‘intervention’ if president refuses to leave White House

Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner are being considered as White House envoys to tell Donald Trump his time is up

Harriet Alexander
Saturday 07 November 2020 19:06 GMT
Comments
White House aides discussing staging an intervention to tell Donald Trump he has to leave
Leer en Español

Donald Trump’s aides are quietly discussing among themselves who is going to break the news to him that he has lost, according to a report, with Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner being considered as likely figures to tell him.

"I had one person close to the White House tell me, 'No one is willing to tell King Lear the truth,'" said Hallie Jackson, MSNBC’s White House correspondent. 

On Friday morning, with the election appearing to be heading in Joe Biden’s direction, CNN’s White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins said she too had been told that Mr Trump was unlikely to concede, and discussions were being held as to how to convince him to leave.

“I’m actually being told by sources that, in recent days, the president has said he has no plans to concede this election to Joe Biden, even if his path to victory is effectively blocked, which it could be by a Biden win in Pennsylvania or in somewhere like Georgia,” she said. 

“But despite that the president has said that he has no plans to concede this election as he has continued to push this baseless claim that the election is being stolen from him.

Follow live: US election 2020 results, updates and analysis 

“That creates this conversation about who is going to be the person that’s going to reckon with the president and tell him that his time in office could be coming to an end. 

“That’s a conversation that I’m told the president’s allies are still having, they’re not sure who that person is going to be. They’ve talked about Jared Kushner, someone like an Ivanka Trump, but they haven’t figured out who it is to bring the president to terms with reality."

Much speculation has been had about what would happen if Mr Trump refused to leave.

The Secret Service and US Marshalls are believed to be those who would be handed the task.

“It should not be a hostage drama to try and get Trump out of the White House,” said David Axelrod, who served as Barack Obama’s senior advisor.

Andrew Bates, spokesman for the Biden campaign, said they were not worried.

"The US government is perfectly capable of escorting trespassers out of the White House," he said. 

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in