Post-election, President Trump’s two oldest
sons – Don Jr. and Eric –
are known to chafe at the shift in attention to brother-in-law Jared
Kushner, a senior
advisor to the president with an office in the West Wing, sources
tell PEOPLE in this week’s cover story.
Read the article here.
Update #3: People is still ragging on Donald Trump, Jr. They posted a new story online at 1.35 p.m. Eastern time with this headline: "'Stay Away from Donnie Trump': Inside Don Jr.'s Drinking, Womanizing and Frat Guy Antics"
Read the article here.
Update #2: More about the Trump cover, from Vox.com:
Despite
statistics showing Trump voters
care little about the first family’s contact with Russian
government actors, the story’s prominence on a People cover indicates that the
scandal has broken through to become relevant beyond the realm of political
junkies, and is getting through to the average American consumer of news and
entertainment. People boasts an audience
of more than 41 million people, one of the largest of any American magazine, and is ubiquitous in a way many publications aren’t: People
is available not only by subscription and in the magazine racks of bookstores
and newsstands but also in the checkout racks at most major grocery chains.
In
short: The editors of People are motivated to sell magazines, and the People
covers, calling out from among racks of other magazines, are a major tool for
selling them. Per reporting from
the magazine data organization MagNet, in 2016, 373.2 million magazines were
sold at newsstands and grocery store checkouts around the country. Time Inc.,
which owns People, was listed as the second-largest national distributor. If
People’s editors didn’t think readers would be interested in this story, they
wouldn’t have broken with their typical fawning coverage of the Trumps and
pushed other go-to topics like the British royal family and Kardashian-related
drama to the margins (literally).
As stories continue to break connecting
the Trump campaign to the Kremlin, and the Trump administration and its
supporters work to dismiss the
allegations as a distraction, the People cover could prove to be a turning
point — evidence that the scandal’s gravity is being felt far beyond the field
of political punditry. Read the article here.
Update #1: I'm not the only one who thinks this is interesting:
— Matthew Yglesias (@mattyglesias) July 19, 2017
Original post:
Issue dated July 31, 2017: The Trumps
Eight months after the election People runs a Trump cover story and it's a doozy. I've been expecting something like "Melania: How She Stays Gorgeous At 47," or "Ivanka: Working For Dad, Raising Three Kids, Inside Her Perfect Life," but People waited for a scandal to feature the first family on the cover. The headline says "Trump Family" but the article is mostly about Don Jr. and the Russia scandal:
Those
who know and have studied Donald
Trump Sr. and the grown children running his empire while he’s
president—Don Jr., Ivanka and Eric—say the family is guided by their father’s
creed of winning at all costs and never admitting mistakes.
Though
the president publicly defended his eldest son, telling reporters
39-year-old Don
Jr. is a “good boy” and insisting “nothing happened with the meeting,”
sources say performance is what matters to the patriarch.
“He
doesn’t like failure and mistakes, and he doesn’t accept them,” says a source
who has had business dealings with Trump. “You have to justify your existence
to be in his realm.”
These
days, the child most in Trump’s “realm” is his daughter Ivanka, 35, who, by all
accounts, has always been his favorite.
Long
outshone by his sister—first at the Trump Organization and now in the White
House, where she and her husband, Jared Kushner, have West Wing offices and
White House titles—Don Jr. has had a harder time adapting to life after the
election.
...A friend of the Trump brothers tells PEOPLE they hate their role as First Sons: “Eric and Don, they never wanted this.”
Yikes. I had Don Jr. and his scandal on the guessing game list last week, and back on March 19, I suggested People run a story about the rivalries in the family:
If People wants to get juicy, they should tee up a story about the rivalries between the Trump children. Ivanka and Jared are now both right there in the White House, "advising" Dad and hobnobbing with world leaders like Angela Merkel and the Prime Minister of Japan. We see pictures of their kids boarding Marine One. Donald Jr. and Eric are banished and have to stay away to run the business. Plus, their financial situations are different. If anything ever happens to The Donald, Ivanka will still be married to a very rich man. Her husband is just as rich, or possibly richer, than her father. The boys? Not so much. Fascinating. (Read the post here.)
Other than a couple of on-the-record quotes from ethics lawyers, the story currently posted at people.com is based on sources and "a family friend especially close to Don Jr. and Eric." The magazine didn't actually speak to the president or his family members. (And I wonder, is Eric relieved or annoyed that he and his slicked back hair didn't make the cover photo?)
The royal children get a small topline headline about their trip to Poland, with no mention of Prince George's upcoming 4th birthday. Blac Chyna, who was also on the guessing game list last week, "tells all" this week.
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