Ivanka Trump offered an alternative definition for 'complicit.' The internet was on it.

Ivanka Trump gets schooled on what "complicit" means
(Image credit: CBS News/YouTube)

Let's be fair: Voters did not elect Ivanka Trump president of the United States. Despite unreasonably high hopes that she would act as a moderating influence on her father, President Trump, she doesn't make policy. As a newly minted special assistant to the president (in her case, an unpaid official West Wing job), Ivanka Trump should have some formal sway, but unlike her husband, senior adviser Jared Kushner, her areas of influence have not yet been defined.

Still, in an interview for Wednesday's CBS This Morning, Gayle King asked Trump about criticism that she and Kushner are "complicit in what is happening to the White House." Trump suggested a new definition for complicit. "If being complicit is wanting to be a force for good and to make a positive impact, then I'm complicit," she said.

That's not what "complicit" means, but Ivanka wasn't the only person unclear on the definition:

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In March, Saturday Night Live also defined "complicit," in a fake perfume ad starring Scarlett Johansson as Ivanka. "Complicit: the fragrance for the woman who could stop all of this, but won't. (Also available in a cologne for Jared.)"

"I don't know what it means to be complicit, but I hope time will prove I have done a good job and that my father's administration is the success I know it will be," Trump told King. "I don't know that the critics who say that of me, if they found themselves in this very unique and unprecedented situation that I am now in, would do any differently than I'm doing."

Coincidentally, Ivanka's brother Eric Trump also made news on Tuesday for his take on a single word, in his case "nepotism." Forbes surfaced an interview Eric Trump gave the magazine in February at Trump Tower, where he and his brother, Don. Jr., now run The Trump Organization for their father. "Nepotism is kind of a factor of life," he said. "We might be here because of nepotism, but we're not still here because of nepotism."

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Peter Weber, The Week US

Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.