As Trump strode past a line of stars and stripes to declare his intention to become the 47th president, there were some familiar faces missing among the crowd gathered in his Mar-a-Lago ballroom.
The former president took time to thank his wife, Melania, and son, Eric Trump, during his meandering speech but no mention was made of his two absent daughters.
Tiffany Trump was thought to be a no-show after going on her honeymoon following her marriage to Michael Boulos in a lavish ceremony on November 12.
The absence of Trump's eldest daughter, Ivanka, was also noteworthy after years spent by her father's side in business and throughout his presidency.
Within hours of the "big announcement", it became clear her decision to skip the event was a deliberate one.
While she said she loved her father "very much", she revealed that, this time around, she wanted to "prioritise my young children and the private life we are creating as a family".
"I do not plan to be involved in politics. While I will always love and support my father, going forward I will do so outside the political arena," she said in a statement posted to her Instagram story.
Six years ago, Ivanka and her husband, Jared Kushner, uprooted their high-society lives in New York and moved to the nation's capital to serve in the Trump administration.
Ivanka worked as a close adviser to her father, accompanying him on foreign trips and "casually dropping by" the oval office during high-profile meetings, to the frustration of Republican leaders and aides.
The rising star was joined in the White House by her husband, considered among the most influential voices during the president's term in office.
But after a messy 2020 campaign and the events of January 6, Ivanka Trump has decided to call time on her public life to spend more time with her family.
The decision will likely disrupt Trump's ambitions for a dynasty in the White House in 2024, particularly as other Republican challengers look set to vie for the mantle of Trumpism in the lead-up to the presidential campaign.
Ivanka and Kushner's retreat from political life
Ivanka and her husband may have fought for Trump's political future in 2020, but as votes trickled in on election night, the pair saw the writing on the wall.
According to the New York Times, within hours they were already planning to pack up and move to Miami.
In the fallout from the insurrection on the US Capitol, the couple was called to give testimony as part of the January 6 hearings.
Ivanka told the committee she did not believe her father was in a position to declare victory on election day, while Kushner went further, claiming to have warned the president not to take Rudy Giuliani's advice to do so.
Donald Trump sought to downplay his daughter's concession that there was no significant evidence of electoral fraud, saying she "had long since checked out".
Two years on from the vote that saw the Trump family ousted from the White House, Ivanka is focused on her three young children, while Kushner has launched a private equity firm and released a tell-all memoir.
The pair reportedly told those close to them they have little interest in returning to Washington.
"I'm very proud of what I was able to accomplish," Ivanka told Fox News in an extended statement.
"I left it all on the field, and I don't miss it."
It's unclear how Trump reacted to the news, although reports claim he spent part of Tiffany Trump's wedding begging his eldest daughter and her husband to appear on stage with him for his presidential bid announcement.
After promoting his children to positions of power and influence during his presidency, Trump may have hoped they would one day take up his mantle.
Instead, without his daughter or her husband by his side, Trump has found himself more often in the company of an ever-changing circle of advisers, according to CNN.
"Trump has always framed himself as the anti-establishment candidate," says Emma Shortis, a historian and US politics expert from RMIT.
"But he was always part of a certain establishment and desperate to be part of the political establishment, desperate to have a family legacy on par with the Kennedys.
"So, I think that's always been a part of the plan to have this legacy and this kind of family dynasty."
Understanding America's obsession with political dynasties
America may well have been founded on the desire to prevent government from becoming a family business, but political dynasties have existed throughout American history.
Family brands — from the Kennedys to the Bushes — are an integral feature of US politics, with candidates able to cash in on their star power and political contacts to rise through party ranks.
With their blue-blood pedigrees, their luxurious oceanfront compounds and their multi-generational grip on politics, these clans have long held a certain cultural power.
Their status is also a reflection of the deep division in American society, where power and wealth is particularly concentrated among very few people, according to Dr Shortis.
The Trumps — who spent years together building a real estate business — saw the White House as a natural extension of their family ventures.
Despite having a West Wing office and high-level security clearance, Ivanka insisted her role as an adviser to her father did not violate federal anti-nepotism laws because she was unpaid.
She spearheaded a paid parental leave scheme that granted all federal workers 12 weeks of paid parental leave for the first time in US history.
During the G20 in Osaka in 2017, she hopped into the traditional "family photo" of assembled world leaders, which, until then, had never included actual family members.
She would attend high-level meetings, during which her father would sometimes refer to her as "baby".
"If she ever wanted to run for president, I think she'd be very, very hard to beat," then President Trump told the Atlantic in 2020.
Yet Ivanka has now moved to distance herself from these suggestions, telling Fox News she "never intended to go into politics" nor spend four years serving as a senior White House adviser.
And, Dr Shortis says, with Trump's history of sexism and misogyny, it's likely a lot of Trump's dynastic planning "is around the men in his family".
Don Jr admitted in 2019 that he has political aspirations.
"I definitely enjoy the fight," he told Bloomberg in 2019.
"I definitely like being out there, and I love being able to see the impact and the difference that it makes on these people's lives."
In the lead-up to the 2020 election that would see Trump cast out from power, his campaign manager predicted the family would rebuild the Republican party in their own image.
"The Trumps will be a dynasty that will last for decades, propelling the Republican Party into a new party, one that will adapt to changing cultures," Brad Pascalle said at a campaign event.
"One must continue to adapt while keeping the conservative values that we believe in."
The open question now is whether Trump can maintain his grip on the Republican party long enough to fulfil those ambitions, especially as rivals within the party attempt to take his place at the top.
The new face of Trumpism could be a former protege, not a Trump
With Trump weakened after the Republicans' poor election results and preparing to take on Washington with a smaller inner circle, there is a possibility that his brand of politics lives on without his name attached.
One of the biggest twists of the midterms was the landslide victory of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.
He beat his Democratic challenger, Charlie Crist, proving that this former swing state is now firmly in the Republican column.
DeSantis called his victory "the biggest bright spot" for Republicans.
"It was not so bright in many other parts of the country. It was a substandard performance, given the dynamics that are at play," he said.
DeSantis's former mentor is being widely blamed within the party for the Republicans' poor showing during the midterms.
Despite many predictions that they would walk away with control of both houses of Congress, they only won a slender majority in the lower chamber.
Now, amid widespread repudiation of the only Republican to officially jump into the presidential race, some party elites are wondering if DeSantis can run against him.
DeSantis was once a vocal supporter of Trump but, as his star rises, the former president has begun referring to him as "Ron DeSanctimonious" and making vague threats to release damaging information about him.
DeSantis is so far refusing to say whether he'd consider a run against Trump, insisting everyone "chill out a little bit".
"I have found it astonishing with how much confidence political analysts are asserting that Ron DeSantis will beat Trump, when DeSantis hasn't even said that he will run," Dr Shortis said.
"But, having said that, I think Trump is worried about DeSantis and you can see that because of the way in which he is lashing out at him and doing the Trump thing of making up nicknames, albeit a pretty lame one."
There are still two years to go before the 2024 presidential election — practically an eon in US politics.
It is still far too early to say whether Donald Trump, or Ron DeSantis, or perhaps another Republican, will clinch the nomination.
"I think, certainly, DeSantis is a very savvy political operator, and he has a lot of political capital now with his re-election in Florida, but I'd also say that Florida is not necessarily reflective of the rest of the United States," Dr Shortis said.
"There are also up-and-comers as well in the Republican party, who were styling themselves in the kind of next generation of Republican leadership, many of whom have modelled themselves on Trump."
Dr Shortis also warns that no-one should underestimate Trump, arguing there is a "history of a prominent Republican being touted as the next heir to the Republican candidacy and their fortunes can change so quickly".
Even if Trump's 2024 gambit pays off, he may return to the White House a little lonelier than before.
"He has always presented himself as a political loner, [which] suits his anti-establishment narrative. But it does isolate him," Dr Shortis said.
"We saw him in his presidency increasingly isolate himself as he cut people loose who didn't toe the line, as he expected them to, so he has a consistent history of isolating himself, and then, increasingly lashing out the more isolated he gets."
