Jared Kushner has hit back at an explosive exposé claiming he helped broker an end to the war in Gaza while his company sits on a lucrative stake in a group investing in Israeli military suppliers.
In a rare, lengthy social media post, Donald Trump’s son-in-law accused CNN of a “deeply misleading” report after it examined the increasingly blurry line between his work as the president’s Middle East peace representative and his private fortune.
The rebuke came as Trump continues to feud with the network over its White House press pool access.
“CNN published a deeply misleading story and headline suggesting that my diplomatic work in the Middle East somehow benefited investments in Israeli defense companies,” Kushner said on X.
“But CNN’s own reporting says otherwise. Buried behind a paywall, it acknowledges: “CNN found no indication that Kushner’s actions as a diplomat directly affected the investments reviewed.
“Misleading stories will not distract me from the work President Trump asked me to do: help end wars, bring people together and pursue peace,” he later added. “That work is too important.”
CNN on Thursday reported that Kushner’s private equity firm, Affinity Partners, is the largest shareholder in Phoenix Financial, an Israeli financial giant that has invested at least $456 million in nine companies that provide weapons and equipment to Israeli forces.
Affinity, which Kushner founded and owns, does not directly hold stock in those nine firms, and the network said it found no evidence that his diplomatic work for the Trump administration had affected Phoenix’s investment decisions.
But the overlap has renewed questions about potential conflicts of interest given Kushner’s dual role as both a private investor and an unofficial White House representative in one of the world’s most sensitive and long-running conflicts.
His firm also cashed out roughly a quarter of its Phoenix stake for more than $340 million in July—a return of more than five times its original investment—while retaining a stake worth more than $1 billion at the time.
Kushner, however, insists his actions were not improper.
“Phoenix is not a defense company. It is one of Israel’s largest publicly traded financial institutions, highly regulated and managing approximately $220 billion across thousands of investments,” he wrote, likening it to Vanguard or Fidelity.
“It manages the retirement savings of millions of Israelis. The savers don’t choose the individual investments, and neither do I. I have no role in deciding what Phoenix buys or sells.”
He also accused CNN of burying the key qualification that it found no evidence his diplomacy affected the investments.
“Those facts make for a less provocative headline, but a much more accurate story,” Kushner wrote.
The sensitivity stems from Kushner’s unusually intertwined business and diplomatic history.
During Trump’s first term, he was a senior White House adviser involved heavily in Middle East policy while his wife, Ivanka, worked as a special adviser to her father.
After leaving government, Kushner founded Affinity, which subsequently received a reported $2 billion investment from Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund. Kushner has defended that relationship as legal and appropriate.
But his current arrangements with the White House have attracted congressional scrutiny because Kushner is a presidential special envoy but not a federal employee, leaving questions about which federal ethics rules apply to his private investments.
His broadside comes as his father-in-law is locked in an escalating fight with the press.
The White House recently barred CNN reporters from its grounds, alongside journalists from MS NOW and Politico, after Trump accused the outlets of publishing “fake news.” A federal judge subsequently ordered access restored, and the news organizations are fighting to keep it.
Kushner, meanwhile, says he is finally done staying quiet, writing in a separate post: “For the last 10 years, I have ignored false and misleading stories about me. But the cycle has gotten out of control.”
“From time to time, I’m going to respond,” he added.
