Ivanka stands in contrast to Prez Trump, says whistleblower's ID not 'relevant' days after Don Jr tweeted CIA agent's name
President Donald Trump's daughter and senior White House aide, Ivanka Trump, stood in stark contrast to her father on Friday as she said the identity of the whistleblower is "not particularly relevant" to the investigation.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, in September, initiated an impeachment inquiry against Trump after a whistleblower lodged a formal complaint alleging that the president had sought favor from the Ukrainian president to investigate his political rival, former Vice President Joe Biden.
Ivanka's statement came days after her brother, Donald Trump Jr, tweeted the name of the whistleblower, a CIA agent, drawing widespread backlash. A government whistleblower's identity is protected by federal law. The Inspector General Act of 1978 states that agency watchdogs “shall not, after receipt of a complaint or information from an employee, disclose the identity of the employee without the consent of the employee, unless the inspector general determines such disclosure is unavoidable," the New York Post reported.
Ivanka, on Thursday, said the whistleblower should not be a "substantive part" of the conversation and noted that the person was not among the administration officials who heard the controversial call between Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, on July 25 this year.
"This is a third party who was not privy to the call and did not have firsthand information," Ivanka said. "That is what was the catalyst for all of this discussion. But to me, it’s not particularly relevant aside from what the motivation behind all of this was.” The White House aide is currently on a three-day visit to Morocco.
President Trump has been consistently tweeting, calling for the whistleblower's identity to be publicly revealed.
The whistleblower's lawyer, Andrew Bakaj, on Wednesday, warned that such calls endanger the person in question and also the system formulated in the constitution to protect whistleblowers.
"Identifying any name for the whistleblower will simply place that individual and their family at risk," he told AFP. "It won’t, however, relieve the president of the need to address the substantive allegations, all of which have been substantially proven to be true.