First lady Jill Biden will visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City on Thursday night for a gala celebrating the 60th anniversary of Jackie Kennedy founding the White House Historical Association.
She will rub shoulders with former first daughter Caroline Kennedy and disgraced activist Tina Tchen, who left the advocacy group Time’s Up after helping Gov. Andrew Cuomo discredit his first sexual harassment accuser, Lindsey Boylan, according to a guest list.
The association, headquartered off Lafayette Square near the White House, was founded in 1961 as a nonprofit to direct private funds to conservation work and art acquisition.
Biden is scheduled to give remarks at the ritzy Manhattan affair after arriving at the Met around 8 pm.
A long list of rich, famous and influential people are expected to attend.
The guest list includes at least two billionaires, Herb Kohler and David Rubenstein, philanthropist Adrienne Arsht, journalist Al Roker, Goldman Sachs executive John F.W. Rogers and President Lyndon Johnson’s daughter Luci Baines Johnson.
Trump White House decorator Tham Kannalikham, Trump housing secretary Ben Carson’s son Ben Carson Jr. and President George W. Bush’s ambassador to Finland Bonnie McElveen-Hunter also are expected to attend.
Tchen, who formerly worked in the Obama White House, isn’t the only scandal-tainted influencer who RSVPed.
Ghada Irani, a Southern California philanthropist accused in 2016 of mistreating, trafficking and falsely imprisoning her maids, is expected at the Met, as is Howard University president Wayne Frederick, whose $1 million salary has drawn controversy at the historically black college, where students have been staging a nearly monthlong protest over poor living conditions.
Tchen resigned as CEO of the anti-sexual harassment group Time’s Up in August — shortly after Cuomo resigned as governor — when it emerged that top Cuomo aide Melissa DeRosa contacted another Time’s Up leader, Roberta Kaplan, about a draft letter responding to Boylan, who accused the governor of unwanted kissing and solicitation, including recommending they play strip poker.
Kaplan shared Cuomo’s draft response with Tchen. One day later, Tchen allegedly told her subordinates to “stand down” from a plan to publicly support Boylan.
The New York gala follows controversy in September over the annual Met Ball that benefits the museum’s Anna Wintour Costume Center. The ball featured Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) wearing a “Tax the Rich” dress as she partied unmasked with the 1 percent while their servers and aides wore anti-COVID-19 masks.
Ocasio-Cortez arrived in a four-person entourage with Benjamin Bronfman of the wealthy Lehman Brothers family, whose father, ex-Warner Music CEO Edgar Bronfman Jr., had just bought a $12 million mansion in exclusive Palm Beach, Fla.