Life

Why Don’t Women Designing Ivanka Trump’s Fashion Line Get Paid Maternity Leave?

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By Josefin Dolsten August 8, 2016

Ivanka Trump has made her brand about supporting working women, and she says her father is on board. But how can we take her at her word when her clothing line designers don’t get a single day of paid maternity leave, and her father underpays his female employees?

The company licensed to design and distribute Ivanka’s fashion line, G-III Apparel Group, grants only the 12 weeks of unpaid maternity leave required by law, the Washington Post revealed.

“It’s hard enough emotionally to come back to work right after having a baby,” one G-III designer said. “But to know you’re returning to a company that doesn’t value your choice to be a mother makes it harder.”

Five current and past employees confirmed the woman’s testimony to the Washington Post.

The hypocrisy lies both in Ivanka’s “Women Who Work” initiative, which seeks to empower working women and in her support for her father despite a stream of sexism allegations.

Her website features tips on how to resign gracefully from a job or how to earn trust in the workplace.

But what good is her advice for the women designing her clothes who feel like they have to choose between excelling in their careers or being a mother?

In her speech at the Republican National Convention, Ivanka portrayed her father as a great supporter of working women.

“At my father’s company, there are more female than male executives, women are paid equally for the work that we do, and when a woman becomes a mother she is supported, not shut out,” she said, according to Time.

But a recent Boston Globe report showed that Donald Trump paid his male staffers a third more than his female staffers.

And Ivanka has kept mum on her father’s repeated sexist remarks, such as calling Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly “a bimbo” for interrogating him on accusations of sexism and saying Republican opponent Carly Fiorina would not become president due to her appearance.

While it is conceivable that Ivanka was unaware of the maternity leave policy, perhaps she needs to take a step back and focus on the sexism caused by her own family and business campaigns before making grand statements.

Contact Josefin Dolsten at [email protected] or on Twitter, @JosefinDolsten

Josefin Dolsten is a New York-based writer who has reported for the Forward, Jewish Telegraphic Agency, The Times of Israel and other Jewish publications. She currently works as an account director at Fenton Communications, supporting organizations that work to advance racial justice, LGBTQ+ equality, reproductive rights and more. Dolsten earned her B.A. in government from Cornell University and her M.A. in comparative religion and Jewish studies from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

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