Gloria Steinem Explains Why Ivanka Trump Isn’t A Feminist

Image by Getty

By Thea Glassman May 9, 2017

Try to put the name Ivanka Trump in the same sentence as feminist, and you’ll get an earful from Gloria Steinem.

During an interview with Refinery29, the activist was asked if she thought the president’s daughter was co-opting feminism — to which Steinem replied: “Nobody on earth thinks she’s a feminist, are you kidding me?”

The 83-year-old pointed out that Trump has not taken a pro-choice stand, and then criticized her take on maternity leave.

“I saw her being interviewed by Cosmopolitan, and she was asked about her maternity leave policy, but it’s only if you physically give birth,” Steinem said. “It’s not for adoptive parents, not for fathers.”

Steinem also shook her finger at Trump’s decision to promptly end the interview, after the Cosmopolitan reporter tried to ask follow-up questions.

The president’s daughter maternity leave policy, she added, has darker roots.

“That happens to be the same policy as every authoritarian regime on Earth that I know of, including Hitler’s Germany,” Steinem said. “I’m not saying that she knows this, but [the Nazis] were paying women to have children. By accident, perhaps, that’s her policy.”

Thea Glassman is an Associate Editor at the Forward. Reach her at [email protected] or on Twitter at @theakglassman.

Thea Glassman was an associate editor for the Forward. Follow her on twitter @theakglassman.

A message from our Publisher & CEO Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism so that we can be prepared for whatever news the rest of 2025 brings.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Membership Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO