Ivanka Trump wasn’t the only rich and famous person to head to the posh and snowy mountain town of Aspen, Colorado, to celebrate the Christmas holidays.
But according to a report, President Donald Trump’s daughter and her family were the only visitors to arrive with a contingent of Secret Service agents that was so large that it put the village and its nearby ski slopes into “full-blown security lockdown” — much to the dismay of others hoping to enjoy the long weekend.
“You’d think she was the President himself,” one guest said, according to entertainment reporter and gossip columnist Rob Shuter on his Naughty But Nice Substack. Witnesses told Shuter that the scale of protection surrounding Ivanka Trump, her husband Jared Kushner and their three children, Arabella, Joseph and Theodore, “stunned even Aspen regulars, who are used to A-listers and billionaires blending in quietly.”
“She acts like she’s the first lady,” another person complained, according to Shuter. “The security footprint was massive. It completely disrupted skiing for everyone else.”
TMZ reported that notable figures who visited Aspen this past weekend included Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos and his new wife Lauren Sanchez, along with Mariah Carey, Kyle Richards, Brooks Nader and Goldie Hawn, the latter of whom is a longtime Aspen regular. Controversial Trump administration figure Robert F. Kennedy Jr. also enjoyed a family vacation in Aspen, TMZ added.
But it sounds like these figures managed to blend in, even though some were photographed by paparazzi while others shared their Aspen vacation photos on Instagram.
“Aspen values discretion,” a source said. “Celebrities come here to disappear — not to shut the place down.” Another Ivanka Trump issue that rankled some in town is that she no longer holds any official government role — not like during her father’s first administration when she and her husband were White House senior advisers.
“She’s not in office,” one source said. “But she moved through Aspen like she was still running Washington.”
But although Ivanka Trump is no longer in office, she and her family are still entitled to Secret Service protection as she is the daughter of a sitting president. But the number of dedicated agents guarding Arabella, Joseph and Theodore individually and together also seemed excessive, according to Shuter.
“Seeing armed security hovering around kids on the slopes was surreal,” someone told Shuter. “And knowing the public is footing the bill? People were not happy.”
None of these grievances were apparent in any of the vacation photos that Ivanka Trump shared publicly on Instagram.
“Merry Christmas from the mountains,” she cheerfully captioned a collection of photos, which presented a picture of a holiday that was both luxurious but also cozy and all about family togetherness. No Secret Service agents were in sight. Instead, Ivanka Trump showed herself and her family posing for a group photo in front their rental mansion. She also showed herself and her kids on the ski slopes and shared two photos of her and her daughter, sitting in front of a fireplace and putting together what appeared to be vision boards.
“For Ivanka, it was a picture-perfect mountain Christmas,” Shuter wrote. “For everyone else? Roadblocks, closed paths, and a lingering sense that the town had been commandeered.”
