Former President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner has a well deserved reputation for being soft-spoken and reserved, even stoic, but his quest for privacy achieved a new level while serving as a senior advisor to Trump.
As detailed in his new book, “Breaking History: A White House Memoir,” Kushner privately battled thyroid cancer while serving in the White House, Fox News reported.
Kushner, 41, was very private about his health issues after learning he likely had thyroid cancer in October 2019 during high-level trade talks with China — he didn’t even tell then-President Trump.
“As this high-wire act of trade talks with the Chinese progressed, I had to confront an unexpected and frightening personal problem,” Kushner wrote in his book.
“On the morning that I traveled to Texas to attend the opening of a Louis Vuitton factory, White House physician Sean Conley pulled me into the medical cabin on Air Force One. ‘Your test results came back from Walter Reed,’ he said. ‘It looks like you have cancer. We need to schedule a surgery right away.’ The next morning, I told Ivanka what I knew. With as much confidence as I could conjure, I told her not to be concerned. Whatever this was, we would find a way to work through it.”
He said he recalled telling Dr. Conley: “Please don’t tell anyone — especially my wife or my father-in-law.”
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Explaining that outside of his wife Ivanka Trump, and a small circle, including his aides Avi Berkowitz and Cassidy Luna and then-chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, Kushner would not inform anyone about his diagnosis.
“With the exception of Ivanka, Avi, Cassidy, and Mulvaney, I didn’t tell anyone at the White House — including the president,” Kushner wrote, according to Fox News.
Keeping himself busy, Kushner said he didn’t want “to think about the upcoming surgery or the unwanted growth in my body.”
“When I did think about it, I reminded myself that it was in the hands of God and the doctors, and that whatever happened was out of my control,” he said. “At moments, I caught myself wondering whether I would need extensive treatment.”
Trump would eventually find out — the day before a scheduled surgery.
“The day before the surgery, Trump called me into the Oval Office and motioned for his team to close the door. ‘Are you nervous about the surgery?’ he asked,” Kushner recounted.
He then asked his father-in-law “how” he knew.
“‘I’m the president,'” Trump said, according to Kushner. “I know everything. I understand that you want to keep these things quiet. I like to keep things like this to myself as well. You’ll be just fine. Don’t worry about anything with work. We have everything covered here.”
Kushner had a “substantial” part of his thyroid removed and a biopsy determined that he did have cancer.
“The biopsy results arrived a few days later, revealing that the nodule indeed was cancerous. Thank God we caught it early,” Kushner shared.
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Tom Tillison grew up in Maryland before moving to Central Florida as a young teen. It is in the Sunshine State that he honed both his passion for politics and his writing skills. Tillison also contributes to BizPac Review.
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