NEW YORK — Ivana Trump, the Czech immigrant who emerged as a Manhattan social scene fixture and business partner to ex-President Donald Trump before their tabloid tsunami-making divorce, was found dead Thursday inside her Upper East Side home. She was 73.
A police source said she was alone inside the home and found on the stairs, although it was unclear if she collapsed or possibly fell, and no foul play was suspected.
“I am very saddened to inform all of those that loved her, of which there are many, that Ivana Trump has passed away at her home in New York City,” Trump wrote. “She was a wonderful, beautiful, and amazing woman, who led a great and inspirational life.”
The couple had three children, daughter Ivanka and sons Don Jr. and Eric, and were divorced after a 14-year marriage in 1992. He called the three children her “pride and joy.”
Son Eric, accompanied by his wife Laura, exited the apartment around 5 p.m. and climbed into a waiting SUV.
“It’s a very sad day guys, a very sad day,” said Eric shortly before an assistant came out carrying Ivana’s pet Yorkie, named Tiger.
The children also released a statement, calling her “an incredible woman — a force in business, a world-class athlete, a radiant beauty and caring mother and friend. Ivana Trump was a survivor.”
Broadway producer Judith Ann Abrams, a friend and neighbor, said Ivana didn’t appear sick during their recent encounters.
“She might have had a little trouble walking,” she recalled. “... She was alone. For Ivana, it was a lot to cope with. But she was always well put-together, never a hair out of place. She was impeccable, God bless her.”
The Trumps emerged as a New York power couple across the 1980s, when Donald’s profile as a developer and casino owner took off while she partnered alongside him at home and at work.
Trump first met the onetime ski racer and occasional model at a crowded Upper East Side restaurant where he found her a table in 1976, and they were married one year later.
Ivana assumed a major role in the Trump Organization, serving as its vice president for interior design and later as president of the Plaza Hotel and her husband’s casino in Atlantic City with her distinctive Czech accent and perfectly-coiffed blond hair.
But the marriage fell apart when Trump began a steamy affair with the younger and blonder Marla Maples, spawning massive tabloid headlines and creating a rift that eventually healed in later years.
But it wasn’t always so. At one point during the acrimonious split, Ivana accused Trump in a sworn statement of raping her in the 1990s, although she later amended the claim to say she felt violated rather than sexually assaulted.
They did eventually reach a level of detente, even as Trump married his third wife Melania.
The New York Daily News reported in September 2015 that she was overheard in an Upper East Side restaurant correctly predicting “The Donald” would be the nation’s next president.
She was even able to joke about the split during her cameo in the 1996 movie “First Wives Club,” where Ivana offered this advice: “Ladies, you have to be strong and independent. And remember, don’t get mad, get everything.”
Ivana Trump backed her ex’s 2016 run for the White House and revealed a year later she and Trump spoke about every two weeks via his direct number in Washington.
The future Manhattan socialite was born Ivana Zelnickova in 1949 in the Czech city of Gottwaldov just one year after the country was taken over by Communists.
And Ivana never lost her faith in marriage: She was wed once before walking down the aisle with Trump, and twice more after their split.
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