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Dear Reader,

The January 6 Committee is going after children.

I don’t mean to alarm you, but it’s true. Children. Granted, every human being has parents, and everyone, at every age, is technically a child of somebody. But still: children.

I have to admit, I missed it, right as it was happening. But thankfully, Donald Trump alerted us all to the predatory menace of the January 6 Committee. “It’s a disgrace, what’s going on. They’re using these things to try and get people’s minds off how incompetently our country is being run. And they don’t care. They’ll go after children,” he noted, after the Committee informally requested information from his own daughter, Ivanka Trump.

Ok, ok, sure. Ivanka is 40 years old. She’s married, with three kids of her own. She’s an Ivy League graduate, a self-styled philanthropist and businessperson. She held a position in Trump’s White House as Senior Advisor to the President — the same position held in other administrations by accomplished adults like George Stephanopoulos, David Gergen, Karl Rove, Valerie Jarrett, David Axelrod, and Cedric Richmond. 

But let’s not lose focus here: children. 

There has long been, for some reason, this standing assumption that Ivanka Trump is entitled to special treatment. “Kid gloves,” if you will. Back in 2012, for example, when the Trump family was trying to launch her real estate career, Ivanka and her brother Don Jr. reportedly lied to potential investors, but somehow dodged criminal charges after a Trump lawyer who had donated generously to the campaign of then-DA Cy Vance came in for a meeting. (Vance returned the donation to the lawyer shortly before the meeting, but later accepted an even larger campaign contribution from the same lawyer, after Vance decided not to file charges.)

When Ivanka’s father became president in 2017, she had absolutely no qualifications to hold any kind of influential policy making position. She was promptly rewarded with a fancy title and an office in the West Wing. She willingly took that job, with all its attendant power and responsibility, and she hobnobbed with heads of state and other powerbrokers. But now that it has come time for the type of accountability that we rightly expect of public officials — suddenly, everyone starts playing hands-off.

The Committee itself has, thus far, taken a light touch with Ivanka Trump. The Committee has sent out dozens of subpoenas, including to other former White House officials. But when it comes to Ivanka – perhaps the single person who would know the most about Donald Trump’s actions and intent relating to the coup attempt, other than Trump himself – just a polite, informal request will do. (As I’ve noted before in this space, the Committee seems to be playing a bit gently with its influential and well-connected subjects.)

Of course, Ivanka Trump herself seems to feel no obligation to say anything. In response to the Committee’s request for information, her spokesperson issued a breezy, non-responsive statement: “As the committee already knows, Ivanka did not speak at the Jan. 6 rally. As she publicly stated that day at 3:15 p.m.: ‘Any security breach or disrespect to our law enforcement is unacceptable. The violence must stop immediately. Please be peaceful.’”

Now let’s break that down. First, “Ivanka did not speak at the Jan. 6 rally.” Ok, fine. Who the hell cares? Nobody thinks she did. Might as well note that Ivanka also was not present when the Hindenburg exploded. What does that matter? The Committee still has plenty of ground to cover with her — like all those things the then-President did and said before and during the January 6 attack, which Ivanka herself witnessed. That’s the relevant part.

Then there’s the spokesperson’s recitation of Ivanka’s tweet. On one level, again: who cares? Oh wonderful — Ivanka finds “disrespect to our law enforcement” to be “unacceptable.” (By the way — tell that to the former President, who now whines that January 6 defendants are being treated unfairly and might merit pardons, if he gets back in the White House.) On another level, let’s not forget that in Ivanka’s initial tweet on January 6, she praised the “American Patriots” who had just stormed the Capitol and attacked the police. She deleted that gem, but screenshots are forever.

And by the way, what’s with this notion that the Committee is somehow “going after” Ivanka, or others? They’re not prosecuting, or harassing, or mistreating anybody. They’re asking for witness testimony. That’s it. You saw something, now come tell us about it. What’s the problem? Why the resistance? The ferocity and defensiveness of the collective Trump response suggests they just might have something to hide.

Enough of this soft-pedaling of all things Ivanka. She took that weighty “senior advisor” title, and she had influence over the country’s official business. As CNN’s Jim Acosta noted to me on air, when he served as the network’s Chief White House Correspondent, the Trump administration often stressed to the media that Ivanka was a real, substantive member of the policy team, and was to be treated as such. 

The Committee should do just that. If she refuses to testify voluntarily and without undue restrictions, then serve a subpoena – as the Committee already has done for many other witnesses. And if she still refuses, hold her in contempt, just like Steve Bannon and Mark Meadows. Anything less than that is special treatment. Ivanka Trump may be used to that from her father’s administration, but she’s not entitled to delicate coddling from the rest of the world, forever. Welcome to adulthood.

Stay Informed,

Elie