Even if the 2016 presidential election had turned out differently — if, say, Donald Trump had been bested in the primaries and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) or Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) had squared off against Hillary Clinton — it is likely that the sister of the eventual 45th president would still be featured in this space. Whether or not her brother had ever become president, Maryanne Trump Barry was a woman of substance, achievement, and conservative temperament and intellect.
Barry, who died on Nov. 13 at age 86, was an assistant United States attorney, a judge on the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey, and an appellate judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit. Like the recently departed James L. Buckley, the U.S. senator and appellate judge who happened to be brother to William F. Buckley, Barry had the advantages and the baggage of having a famous and controversial public sibling, but also like James Buckley, Barry could point to her distinct accomplishments.
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As the first-born of the five children of real-estate developer Fred Trump and his wife Mary, Maryanne was nine years older than Donald, the fourth-born. If Donald displayed the demeanor, drive, and inclination early on to enter the New York real-estate arena of his father, Maryanne took some time to discern her calling. In 1958, she received a bachelor’s degree from Mount Holyoke College. Two years later, she married her first husband, David Desmond, with whom she had a son. Although she attained a master’s degree in public law and government from Columbia University in 1962, she spent the remainder of the decade raising her family.
Then, she set a new path for her life: In 1974, after earning a law degree from Hofstra University, she embarked on a tenure as a federal prosecutor in the District of New Jersey. In 1983, the same year Donald Trump unveiled the newly constructed Trump Tower, Barry, then married to her second husband John Barry, was tapped as a nominee for the federal bench by President Ronald Reagan.
So respected had she become on that bench that, by 1999, Maryanne Trump Barry was a bipartisan choice to become an appellate judge. That year, President Bill Clinton nominated Barry for a judgeship on the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals. In confirming her, the Senate did not register a single nay vote. “I assume that my record is good enough as a district court judge to be reached out to, and I’m glad that politics weren’t a priority here,” Barry said upon receiving the nomination.
It’s unclear whether Donald Trump was at that point a Republican, Democrat, or independent, or merely a popular talk-show guest and pitchman for commercials, but one thing is clear: The Trump surname had not yet become an automatic disqualifier for public service in the eyes of the elite. And our courts were better for it: Barry became a senior judge in 2011 and retired outright in 2019 during what had become, following her brother’s election, a far different political climate.
By all accounts, Barry was a fair-minded — and, to adopt a favorite term of her brother — tough judge. In recent years, some have looked to Barry to bolster their arguments about the alleged unfitness for office of the former president — arguments Barry gave weight to, inadvertently, through comments she made to her niece, Mary L. Trump, that were widely publicized. In inveighing against the then-president’s tweeting and lack of preparation, Barry’s private remarks were hardly a bombshell and today register as little more than the casual conversation of a spitfire sibling — evidently a family trait.
In fact, Barry seems to have been fully engaged in the Trump family: She served as the officiant at the fourth marriage of Donald Trump’s ex-wife, Ivana, and she was present at her brother’s inauguration. Her hairdo, mien, and even some of her opinions on political correctness each called to mind her brother. In a 1992 article in the New York Times, speaking in the shadow of the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings, she was quoted as objecting to equating “every sexy joke of long ago” with sexual harassment. Hear, hear. She characterized herself as a “traditional woman,” saying, “I like a little chivalry, I like to receive flowers, I like taking care of a son and a husband, and in my judgment, those who recoil from these things don’t know what they’re missing.” When a man says something offensive, Barry sensibly counsels women to ask why the offending man was a jerk or hadn’t grown up rather than using the “atom bomb.”
What can be said except that Maryanne and Donald grew up in the same household, with the same parents, and undoubtedly absorbed many of the same values? Above all, though, Maryanne Trump Barry will be remembered as a dedicated jurist, a fine legal mind, and one who, like her brother, did it her way.
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Peter Tonguette is a contributing writer to the Washington Examiner magazine.