Celebrities Who Converted to Judaism

Ivanka Trump converted to Judaism in 2009 before her marriage to Jared Kushner.

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Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner met at a networking lunch arranged by one of her longtime business partners in 2007 when they were both 25 years old.

“They very innocently set us up thinking that our only interest in one another would be transactional,” Ivanka told Vogue in 2015. “Whenever we see them we’re like, ‘The best deal we ever made!'”

Trump and Kushner, who grew up in an Orthodox Jewish family, later broke up due to their religious differences: The Trump family is Presbyterian, while it was expected that Kushner would marry someone Jewish.

However, three months later, the pair got back together. By 2009, Trump had converted to Judaism and she and Kushner were engaged. 

She and Kushner keep a kosher diet, which she described to Vogue in 2015, saying she stays away from raw fish and meat.

“I always shied away from it being a public conversation because it’s such a personal thing,” she said of her conversion to Judaism. “We’re pretty observant, more than some, less than others. I just feel like it’s such an intimate thing for us.”

“It’s been such a great life decision for me,” she continued. “I am very modern, but I’m also a very traditional person, and I think that’s an interesting juxtaposition in how I was raised as well. I really find that with Judaism, it creates an amazing blueprint for family connectivity.”

She also said that their family observes the Sabbath.

“From Friday to Saturday we don’t do anything but hang out with one another,” she said. “We don’t make phone calls.”