Meghan McCain Criticizes Ivanka Trump For Being Contradictory & "Confusing"

In a recent interview, Meghan McCain praised President Trump for privately calling her and promising to refrain from any more public bashing of her father. But the political pundit had no similar compliments for the president's eldest daughter. Meghan McCain called Ivanka Trump's public statements "confusing," and said she would like to "hear more" from the White House adviser on "all politics."

McCain's comments came during an interview with POLITICO's Women Rule podcast. When the subject of Ivanka Trump came up, McCain had a few questions. Noting that she works in the White House as an official adviser to the POTUS, McCain expressed incredulity at Ivanka Trump's claim that she tries to avoid getting involved in politics.

You're an advisor to your father, who also happens to be the president, and you're not a political person? I don't like things like that.

She also weighed in on Ivanka Trump's endorsement of Oprah Winfrey's speech at the Golden Globes award ceremony — Ivanka tweeted that she'd seen the speech, calling it "empowering" and "inspiring."

Noting that Oprah's speech was "politically loaded," McCain said she didn't understand how Trump's daughter could have something "nice to say" about comments that were a veiled criticism of her father.

This isn't the first time McCain has had some words for Ivanka Trump. On Jan. 4, McCain commented on rumors the president's daughter harbors presidential aspirations of her own, based on reports from Michael Wolff's bombshell book Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House. In the book, Wolff asserted that Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, have made a deal that she will one day run for president.

The first woman president, Ivanka entertained, would not be Hillary Clinton; it would be Ivanka Trump.

(It should be noted, however, that the reliability of Wolff's account has been called into question on numerous points.)

Wolff's report that Ivanka Trump is planning a presidential run evoked scorn from McCain. "If she's qualified to be president, so am I," McCain said on The View. McCain pointed out her father is also a "famous politician," and that despite Ivanka Trump's business experience that some might find compelling, "we don't have a dynasty on purpose."

In a not-so-subtle dig at the Trump family's friendly coverage on a certain cable news network, McCain observed dryly, "I'd like to see her give an interview to someone besides Fox."

Ivanka Trump wasn't the only female family member McCain commented on. Of the whole Trump brood, McCain singled out First Lady Melania Trump as her favorite. She said she genuinely liked the FLOTUS and didn't understand why "everyone is such a hater on her," though McCain did suggest that her current role of first lady "seems like the worst job in the entire world."

There's been a family feud of sorts between President Trump and the McCains, begun when then-candidate Trump said Sen. John McCain wasn't a real "war hero," as he'd been taken prisoner during the Vietnam War. As Trump told the Family Leadership Summit in 2015, "I like people who weren't captured."

Trump's widely criticized panning of Sen. McCain's war hero status followed the Arizona senator's judgment that Trump had "fired up the crazies" at one of the candidate's contemporaneous rallies in the Grand Canyon State. Sen. McCain was referring to Trump's incendiary approach to discussing immigration, one that the senator said was "very hurtful to me."

Sen. McCain most recently criticized Trump for "doing Putin's job" by releasing the much-hyped "Nunes memo" to the public. That memo purports to prove the FBI was influenced by partisan motivation in investigating Russian ties to Trump's 2016 campaign team.

McCain has been a reliable defender of her father. Now it seems that she holds Ivanka Trump in some contempt for the latter's attempts to have it both ways — "supporting" her father while also vying for his liberal critics' approval.