Ivana Trump might have spent fourteen years married to Donald Trump and borne three of his children but she cannot decide whether or not he is feminist.

Speaking forthrightly about the Republican presidential frontrunner and billionaire tycoon, the Czech-American model initially said she didn't think her former husband was a feminist.

“I don’t think he’s feminist. He loves women. But not a feminist,” she said in an interview with The New York Post.

But according to the paper, the initial statement was followed by some rather mixed messages. “Ivana’s reps called The Post two days after the interview to clarify that Donald was a feminist. Then they called to say he wasn’t. An hour later, they said he was.”

Of course, feminism isn’t a label usually associated with the mogul-turned-politico. On the contrary, Trump has faced frequent accusations of sexism throughout the course of his presidential campaign.

Just last week, the New York-born politician suggested women having illegal abortions should face criminal punishment and last summer, he prompted criticism for saying Fox News Channel anchor Megyn Kelly had “blood coming out of her wherever”.

Ivana was married to the 69-year-old from 1977 to 1992 but divorced when rumours that her husband was having an affair with a former beauty queen Marla Maples began to circulate.

According to Ivana, it was this widely publicised scandal which initially stopped the Republican hopeful from running for president.

“Probably five years before our divorce, Reagan or somebody brought him a letter and said, ‘You should run for president’. So he was thinking about it. But then . . . there was the divorce, there was the scandal, and American women loved me and hated him.

“So there was no way that he would go into [politics] at that point. But he was always tooling around with the idea,” she added.

The former model and socialite remains on good terms with the GOP frontrunner and says she helps to advise him on policy.