‘Coffee With Ivanka’ Fundraising Page Mysteriously Taken Down After Scrutiny

GOOD MORNING AMERICA - Lara Spencer interviews Ivanka Trump on "Good Morning America," 7/19/16, airing on the ABC Television Network.
(ABC/Lorenzo Bevilaqua)
LARA SPENCER, IVANKA TRUMP
Lorenzo Bevilaqua/ABC
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A charity fundraising page which was auctioning off a coffee date with Ivanka Trump to the highest bidder has been taken down without explanation, NPR first reported Friday.

The fundraiser, for the Eric Trump Foundation, said the money raised would benefit St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. The auction had seen bidding reach $77,888, according to NPR. The charity page was taken down some time Friday morning.

The event initially offered “30-45 minutes” of time to meet with Ivanka Trump, along with a guest of the bidder’s choice, in New York City or Washington, D.C. The New York Times reported Thursday that many of the bidders for the event wanted access to Ivanka Trump in order to communicate a message to the incoming administration, in which it seems she and her husband, Jared Kushner, will play a part.

The last cached copy of the fundraiser on the WayBack Machine, which archives copies of web pages, shows bidding at $72,888 at 8:09 AM ET on Friday. There had been 28 bids for the coffee meeting at that point.

Eric Trump told the Times that the Trump children had held the charity meet-and-greet every year. He also told the publication, about an hour after it initially asked him about the event, that he was considering shutting down the bidding.

Representatives of Trump’s transition team did not respond to TPM’s questions about the fundraiser for this story.

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Notable Replies

  1. “many of the bidders for the event wanted access to Ivanka Trump in order to communicate a message to the incoming administration”

    And there you have it. Pay to play. This thing didn’t disappear…it just went underground.

  2. Ralph, have some pity on that poor brick.

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