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Ivanka's story of son building Lego White House for Trump looks like rehash of old tale she told about herself

A reporter said that Ivanka's story resembles her story of building Trump Tower and claimed that the older story was fake anyway

President Donald Trump's eldest daughter Ivanka, during her introductory speech at the Republican National Convention (RNC) on Thursday, August 27, told a story about her son gifting a Lego replica of the White House to her father, the president. However, it appears that the first daughter relayed a similar story years ago — about herself.

"When Jared and I moved with our three children to Washington, we didn’t exactly know what we were in for. But our kids loved it from the start," the White House presidential adviser said. "My son Joseph promptly built grandpa a Lego replica of the White House. The president still displays it on the mantel in the Oval Office and shows it to world leaders, just so they know he has the greatest grandchildren on earth."

However, a WYNC reporter, Andrea Bernstein, took to Twitter to point out that Ivanka's story resembles another one she had previously recounted about herself. Ivanka, during a 2007 interview with Conan O'Brien, had reportedly said that she had built a Lego replica of Trump Tower for her father, according to a book Bernstein wrote about the Trump and Kushner families titled 'American Oligarchs'. Ivanka had also said that her brothers at the time had contradicted her, with each of them claiming that they were the ones to build the Lego tower.

Bernstein took social media on August 27 to claim that the White House adviser's story was fictional: "OMG, Ivanka is telling a story about her son Joseph building a lego model of the White House. She told the same story about herself once, building a lego Trump Tower. The story was made up." The journalist also said that the story was plagiarized from 'The Art of the Deal,' President Trump's bestselling book ghostwritten by Tony Schwartz.

Schwartz, according to 'American Oligarchs,' told Bernstein that the lego story was possibly made up. "There is a considerably less than fifty percent chance that anything like that ever happened," he said of the story.

Ivanka, in her 2009 book 'The Trump Card,' also reportedly acknowledged that the story was fake. She wrote in the book: "The story stands as one of the first and best examples of how we work together as a family."

The first daughter, in her speech, mentioned that the lego piece was displayed on the fireplace mantel in the Oval Office. However, recent images of the mantel do not show any such set being displayed. Bloomberg News' White House editor Alex Wayne also remarked on Ivanka's comments, saying none of his outlet's reporters have ever seen the Lego White House. "Our reporters are in the Oval Office nearly every day. None of them have ever seen the Lego White House," Alex Wayne tweeted.

The possibly fictional story from the White House adviser comes at a time she has been accused of violating the Hatch Act by speaking at the RNC event hosted on the White House South Lawn. According to the Act, federal employees are barred from engaging in political activities, including campaigning, using federal resources. The US president and vice president, however, are exempt under the law.