Ivanka Trump has caught a lot of flak for refusing to speak out about controversial issues like family separation, despite positioning herself as a champion for women and children. On Wednesday night at the House Democrats' annual retreat, Chrissy Teigen become the latest celebrity to put the First Daughter on blast, noting that Trump continued posting photos of her kids on social media while immigrant children were being removed from their parents as a result of her father's policies.
Alongside her husband, John Legend, Teigen spoke with former MSNBC host Melissa Harris-Perry and explained that the images of children separated from their parents because of the Trump administration's zero-tolerance policy at the border deeply affected her. "It's a painful thing to see that, and it's a painful thing to see such a complete lack of empathy," she said.
Teigen then pointed out that Ivanka Trump had published images of her son on Instagram when the family separation crisis was at its peak. The photos were criticized as tone-deaf for appearing at a time when thousands of immigrants were trying desperately to reunite with their own children.
"When it comes from people, like Ivanka, I will say, that can post all day pictures of her children that are just in her home and 'Oh, my daughter is having trouble in her crib' or 'My daughter is doing this' and 'My daughter is doing this,' there are children out there that don't have that opportunity," Teigen said.
Last August Trump finally spoke up and called the family separations a "low point."
"I feel very strongly about that. And I am very vehemently against family separation and the separation of parents and children," Trump said at an event with the news site Axios. However, many people on social media wondered why she hadn't been more vocal when the crisis was unfolding.
Since Donald Trump was elected, Teigen has been a forceful critic of his on Twitter. At Wednesday's event, Legend joked that his wife "was ahead of the curve on making fun of Donald Trump." Still, Teigen did leave the audience with one word of advice not for politicians, but for women: Harris-Perry asked her what word she hoped women would use more frequently and Teigen blurted out, "Fuck you." The crowd broke into laughter, and Teigen quickly added, "You don't have to say it.... It is not a word; it's not a sentence. It's a mind-set."
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