Jared Kushner calls his father 'daddy', according to a former employee

'Most weeks, he not only didn’t read the Observer, he didn’t appear to read anything else, either,' claims paper's former editor Kyle Pope

Mr Kushner had a 'deep suspicion and derision of journalism and reporters', Mr Pope claimed (AP Photo/J Scott Applewhite)

White House adviser Jared Kushner still calls his father "daddy", a former employee has claimed.

Kyle Pope, who worked as editor of the New York Observer while Mr Kushner was the newspaper's publisher, described working under Donald Trump's son-in-law in an op-ed piece.

He claimed the then 28-year-old never read the paper, saying: "Most weeks, Kushner not only didn’t read the Observer, he didn’t appear to read anything else, either."

He also said he found it "strange" that Mr Kushner called his father, Charles, "daddy".

"Charles, whom Jared talked to frequently while the father was imprisoned in Alabama, popped in often during my meetings with Jared on Fifth Avenue. I remember this because Jared would refer to him as 'daddy,' which I found strange," Mr Pope wrote in the Columbia Journalism Review.

Mr Pope said Mr Kushner had a "deep suspicion and derision of journalism and reporters" and claimed he would often block "merit" pay rises.

"When I would approach Kushner about raises for the staff, he would almost always balk, pointing out that if we didn’t boost their pay, there was a line of replacements willing to work for the same salary or less," he wrote. "Journalists, in his mind, were essentially interchangeable, and easily replaceable. The fact that they were so poorly paid was evidence, in his mind, that what they did or how they did it could not possibly be that important."

Mr Pope, who is the incoming editor for CJR, also questioned how the Observer might have contributed to the "fake news" environment.

"Throughout [Mr Trump’s] campaign and into his presidency, I have looked back on my short tenure at the Observer for signs of the anti-press fervour I can only assume Kushner has shaped," he said.

"How did this socially ambitious real-estate developer, who bought a beloved Manhattan weekly and counted Rupert Murdoch as one of his personal heroes, end up helping to guide an administration that has made the vilification of anyone associated with journalism a central plank?"

He added: "Did Kushner simply inherit the 'fake news' mantra from his father-in-law, or did he have a hand in creating it? Were there hints during his tenure at the Observer of what was to come?"

Mr Kushner did not respond to Mr Pope's request for comment.