With Ivanka Trump taking on the role of a White House staffer – as assistant to her father President Donald Trump – many are hopeful that she will have his ear and be able to influence his decisions.

A recent report suggests that, despite the high regard he claims to have for his eldest daughter, the president is not always keen on taking her advice.

According to The New York Times, Ivanka urged her father to issue a full apology following the release of the 2005 Hollywood Access tape in which he mentions grabbing women "by the p***y". In the report, Trump first denied having said any of the comments, when informed by his staff. On listening to the clip, however, he agreed to say he was sorry for offending anyone.

Ivanka reportedly pleaded with Trump to make a more complete apology but when his stance remained unchanged, several people present saw his daughter get teary-eyed before she walked out of his office.

The then-presidential candidate attempted to dismiss the sexist statements he had made as "locker-room banter". With critics slamming him for his comments, Trump later issued a video message. "I've said and done things I regret, and the words released today on this more than a decade-old video are one of them... I said it, it was wrong, and I apologise," he said in October 2016.

Ivanka is currently in the spotlight for her latest book Women Who Work, which offers career advice for women. The release has already triggered off criticism over her use of presidential influence to promote her work but she defended her motives.

"Suddenly, after my father declared his candidacy, it became that all the things that I was doing that I was praised for, the same people, the critics, viewed them through this different lens," she told the NYT. "Somehow, all the same things they applauded me for as a millennial, as a female entrepreneur, were now viewed very cynically as opportunistic."

Donald Trump
Ivanka Trump listens while her father US President Donald Trump speaks via video with Nasa astronauts aboard the International Space Station from the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC Brendan Smialowski/AFP