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Donald Trump spent months attacking Hillary Clinton's email use. But he's defended Ivanka.

 

Yep, irony is officially dead.

As The Washington Post’s Josh Dawsey and Carol D. Leonnig reported on Monday, senior White House adviser Ivanka Trump sent hundreds of emails to White House aides, Cabinet officials and her assistants using her personal email account.

According to the Post, Ivanka used her personal account under a domain shared with her husband Jared Kushner to discuss official White House business almost 100 times.

Understandably, the news was seen by many as unbelievably ironic.

After all, Ivanka’s father US President Donald Trump continually attacked the personal email use of Hillary Clinton during his presidential campaign just two years ago.

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And now, two years into his administration, the President still continues to tweet about “Crooked Hillary’s” emails while his supporters still chant “lock her up” at rallies.

Despite blasting Clinton for her private email use, President Trump has defended his daughter’s actions.

“They weren’t classified like Hillary Clinton. They weren’t deleted like Hillary Clinton,” Trump told press on Tuesday.

“You’re talking about a whole different – you’re talking about fake news,” he added.

Despite the irony, it’s important to note that the scale of Clinton and Ivanka’s personal email uses is different.

While Ivanka used her personal email account for official White House business for several months, Clinton used a personal email server for four years while working as Secretary of State.

However, according to The Washington Post, the President’s oldest daughter said she was not familiar with the rules around private email use – despite President Trump’s consistent focus on the issue on the campaign trail.

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It was also reportedly discovered that Ivanka was not receiving White House updates about the prohibited use of private email.

Regardless, Ivanka herself has spoken about the importance of proper email practices in the past.

In her 2010 book The Trump Card: Playing to Win in Work and Life, Ivanka described how emails can come back to haunt you.

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“People are so incredibly slapdash with their electronic messages, as if they were some modern version of smoke signals that can disappear without a trace,” the 37-year-old wrote in an extract shared by Fast Company.

She continued: “We are just as responsible for the emails we receive as the ones we send, something to think about when using your work address to communicate with friends.

“If you and your friends have it set up so this kind of back-and-forth is a central part of your relationship, you should at least be smart about it: use a personal email account so nothing you send or receive can be misconstrued at work.”

LISTEN: Mia Freedman and Amelia Lester examine whether or not Ivanka Trump has the right to switch between First Daughter and Presidential Adviser at will.

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This isn’t the first time a member of the Trump administration has been caught using personal emails for official White House business.

Last year, six White House aides including Ivanka’s husband Jared Kushner were found to have used their personal emails.

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