Profiles in Power: Who Is Jared Kushner, Really?

His father went to federal prison for tax fraud, witness tampering, and illegal campaign contributions. The witness he tampered with was his own sister - he hired someone to seduce her husband, filmed it, and mailed the tape to intimidate her into silence. Former U.S. attorney Chris Christie called it one of the most loathsome, disgusting crimes he had ever prosecuted.

Jared grew up watching all of this. Then he married into the most powerful family in American politics.

Let's talk about what that buys you.

From convicted felon's son to White House senior advisor

Jared Kushner took over the family real estate business after his father Charles was convicted on 18 criminal charges in 2005. No government experience. No foreign policy background. In 2017, he walked into the West Wing as a senior advisor to the President of the United States anyway.

His qualification: he married Donald Trump's daughter.

He was handed the Middle East peace process, the opioid crisis, criminal justice reform, U.S.-Mexico relations, and the Abraham Accords. All of it. A 36-year-old real estate developer with a portfolio underwater in New York.

His father, meanwhile, was pardoned by Trump in December 2020 - then rewarded with the ambassadorship to France. As a convicted felon who had been disbarred in three states, Charles Kushner couldn't have gotten a security clearance as a federal employee. But apparently he can represent the United States to France.

The $3 billion question

On January 21, 2021 - the day after the Trump administration ended, Jared Kushner incorporated a private equity firm called Affinity Partners. Six months later, Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund sent $2 billion his way. The fund's own screening committee had recommended rejecting the deal, citing inexperience and operations that were "unsatisfactory in all aspects." Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman personally overruled them.

That's not a business deal. That's a reward.

When you add Qatar, the UAE, a Taiwanese billionaire, and a fifth investor Affinity still won't name, the total comes to roughly $3 billion - all from foreign governments, with zero U.S. investors.

As of late 2024, Affinity had pocketed approximately $157 million in management fees from those foreign clients while returning no profits to any of them. The Saudis are paying Kushner tens of millions of dollars for their money to sit in a bank account earning nothing.

Why would they do that?

Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden offered a WILD theory: these investments may not be motivated by commercial considerations, but rather the opportunity to funnel foreign government money to members of President Trump's family. Ya think?

The invisible hand

Here's what makes this story stranger than the money. Jared Kushner is almost never on television. For someone who was reportedly the most influential advisor in Trump's first term - who brokered multiple foreign policy outcomes - he has done essentially zero media interviews since leaving the White House.

He said he wanted to stay out of the spotlight.

Then came the 2024 campaign. Then the second term. And according to reporting, Kushner has continued to discuss U.S.-Saudi diplomatic relations with MBS multiple times since leaving government - while simultaneously collecting management fees from the Saudi sovereign wealth fund and helping organize meetings between Qatari officials and prominent U.S. political donors.

That's not being out of the spotlight. That's operating from just outside the frame.

The conversion question and why it actually matters

Here's something most profiles skip over: in Orthodox Judaism, Jewish identity passes through the mother. Not the father. The mother. This is called matrilineal descent - codified in Jewish law for centuries. A child of a Jewish mother is Jewish regardless of the father's background. A child of a Jewish father and a non-Jewish mother is not considered Jewish under traditional Orthodox law, and would require formal conversion.

Jared Kushner is Jewish. Ivanka Trump was not. Their children would not have been considered Jewish without Ivanka converting. Kushner broke up with Ivanka early in their relationship because she wasn't Jewish. They reconciled, and she eventually told him she was open to converting. She converted to Orthodox Judaism in 2009 before they married, adopted the Hebrew name Yael, and has described it as a formative personal journey.

By converting, Ivanka didn't just marry into the Kushner family. She became the Jewish mother of the Kushner line - meaning their children, Arabella, Joseph, and Theodore, are Jewish. Fully, unambiguously, by the most traditional interpretation of the law.

The religion question is not a distraction. It's context. It's where his loyalty lies. The money question is what it leads to.

So who is Jared Kushner?

He's the son of a convicted criminal who leveraged a family connection into the most powerful advisory role in the world, spent four years building relationships with foreign governments, left office with a firm that immediately collected billions from those same governments, and is now quietly involved in U.S. foreign policy while officially being a private citizen managing other people's money.

He's also Trump's family. Which means no one in the Republican Party will touch him. And most of the press has moved on.

Some deals stay open for a long time.

Stay Frustrated.