Maryanne Trump Barry, a former federal judge who was an older sister of Donald J. Trump and served as both his protector and critic throughout their lives, has died. She was 86.
Cause of death
She died at her home on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, according to three people familiar with the matter.
Two of them said the police were called to the home early Monday morning.
None of the people specified a cause, and all spoke on the condition of anonymity.
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A spokesman for Mr. Trump did not respond to a request for comment.
Who is Donald Trump’s sister, Maryanne Trump Barry?
Judge Barry had been on the federal bench in New Jersey, a position that Mr. Trump’s fixer, the lawyer Roy M. Cohn, was credited with helping her attain during President Ronald Reagan’s tenure in the 1980s.
She retired in 2019 after she became the focus of a court investigation stemming from an investigation by The New York Times into the Trump family’s tax practices.
Mr. Trump seemed to heed the words of few people as much as he did his eldest sister’s, according to confidants.
How issues developed between Donald Trump and his sister
But their relationship suffered a significant fissure in the final year of his presidency, when their niece Mary L. Trump, who was promoting a memoir about their family, released recordings of her aunt speaking harshly about the president.
A Republican, Judge Barry was appointed to the District Court in New Jersey by President Reagan in 1983.
President Bill Clinton elevated her to the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in 1993.
She was the widow of John J. Barry, a veteran trial and appellate lawyer in New Jersey.
