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Vivica A. Fox Recalls Offensive Comments Ivanka Made To Black 'Celebrity Apprentice' Contestants
Ivanka Trump—former President Donald Trump's eldest daughter and former White House adviser—was slammed online after being accused of making racist microaggressions towards actress Vivica A. Fox while filming an episode of The Celebrity Apprentice back in 2015.
Fox made an appearance on Thursday's episode of For Real: The Story of Reality TV, where the show's host, Andy Cohen, asked:
"There've been racial controversies that have emerged on so many reality shows. Are there things that have come up pinged for you over the years?"
The Empire actress recalled while on Celebrity Apprentice, Ivanka Trump thought she was complimenting her and Keisha Knight Pulliam on a presentation during a board meeting, telling them:
"You're certainly an articulate group."
According to Queerty, Fox told Cohen:
"I'll never forget that when I did 'Celebrity Apprentice, 'and Ivanka Trump, she said, 'Wow, you speak very well'."
However, Fox believed Trump was deliberately making racist comments.
"No, Andy. I hate to say it."
"I don't think she knew at the time that she was insulting us."
"I really think that she thought she was complimenting us."
"That it was like, 'Oh, wow, you guys are intelligent'."
Cohen quipped in response:
"I don't think she knows now."
You can watch the interview with Cohen in the clip below:
Fox said of Trump's racial microaggressions:
"She was like, 'Oh wow you guys are intelligent'."
"I'm going to say, when the show aired, Twitter went crazy, like, 'What does she mean?'"
Renewed criticism towards Trump proliferated on Twitter after Fox's recollection of her time on the reality show.
Social media users were hardly shocked with many saying the apple doesn't fall far from the tree—referring to her father's own racist comments and behavior.
This was not the first time Ivanka Trump was accused of making a subtle dig against a marginalized group of people.
In an August 2019 tweet, she referred to a massacre near a Chicago playground that never happened and urged people not to "become numb to the violence faced by inner-city communities every day."
She was immediately called out for her fabricated incident.
Her father was well known for making more blatant statements.
According to Newsweek, The Apprentice co-producer Bill Pruitt referenced a book written by Allen Salkin and Aaron Short called The Method to the Madness: Donald Trump's Ascent as Told By Those Who Were Hired, Fired, Inspired—and Inaugurated—in which Trump asked if viewers would "buy" a Black contestant winning his reality show.
The two finalists in the first season of The Apprentice in 2004 were "Kwame Jackson, a Black, Goldman Sachs investment manager who graduated from Harvard Business School, and Bill Rancic, a Croatian-American entrepreneur who owned a Chicago cigar company."
Trump reportedly said at the time:
"But will America buy a [n-word] winning?"
Rancic wound up being the winner of that season.