by Doug Wead
Some British pundits concluded that the unique Anglo-American relationship, especially in light of Brexit, was too important to play with. Her Majesty the Queen, they insisted, must bite her tongue and go ahead with it.
Other sage observers who knew the queen had long ago predicted that her avid curiosity and mischievous temperament would never have allowed her to miss hosting a Trump state dinner.14 It was inevitable. A privately conducted name recognition poll allegedly showed, for better or worse, Donald Trump was the second-most-famous person on earth, after Jesus.15 If the Trumps wanted to meet the queen, well, most likely the queen wanted to meet them too, although she could never admit it to anyone, not even to her corgis. It would be a superb moment for history.
This moment would see the coming together of two very different persons and families, representing very different sociocultural experiences. One family was staid and entrenched, the other brash and provocative. And yet both were masters at building and maintaining brands. On that subject, the queen was perhaps the only person in the world from whom the Trumps could still learn a thing or two. And the queen, who had met so many colorful world leaders and celebrities—well, it would have been a shame to miss the Trumps. They may be only flashing meteors passing overhead, but oh how brightly they shine! To add the trophy of their faces to her vast collection of the world’s most famous and infamous personalities who had dined at her table was a nice win for history. She needed Donald and Melania, but she needed Ivanka and all the other Trumps, too.
That night, Donald Trump raised his glass to the queen. “On behalf of all Americans, I offer a toast to the eternal friendship of our people, the vitality of our nations, and to the long, cherished, and truly remarkable reign of her majesty the queen.”16
What no one knew is the informal way in which the Trump kids arrived at the event. It wasn’t in a fairy tale, golden carriage pulled by six white horses or even in a presidential motorcade of limousines, with drivers in smart uniforms.
“During the state visit in the UK”—Tiffany laughed as she recalled the memory—“my siblings and I took a large van or bus to Buckingham Palace. It was fun as we were all in gowns and tuxes and piled into the bus. It was as if we were in a carpool, but our destination was quite more extravagant than going to school!”
NOTES
1. Unless otherwise indicated, all quotes from Tiffany Trump in this chapter come from an interview with the author in 2019.
2. https://www.instyle.com/news/tiffany-trump-reelection-2020
3. https://www.bustle.com/p/tiffany-trumps-quotes-about-her-dad-speak-volumes-about-their-relationship-8687971
4. I told this story in All the Presidents’ Children (New York: Atria Books, 2003).
5. https://time.com/4530197/college-free-speech-zone/
6. Unless otherwise indicated, all quotations from Donald Trump Jr. in this chapter are from interviews conducted by the author in 2019.
7. https://time.com/4645541/donald-trump-white-house-oval-office/
8. https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/may/27/ian-bremmer-time-magazine-columnist-defends-fake-d/
9. https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/may/27/ian-bremmer-time-magazine-columnist-defends-fake-d/
10. https://twitchy.com/jacobb-38/2019/05/26/deleted-journalist-ian-bremmer-gets-royally-spanked-after-posting-a-fake-trump-quote-to-teach-everyone-a-lesson/
11. Doug Wead, All the Presidents’ Children, (New York: Atria Books, 2003), 105–123 and 287–288.
12. https://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/08/washington/08queen.html
13. https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/donald-trump-to-visit-uk-next-year-but-not-on-a-fullblown-state-visit-and-he-will-not-stay-with-the-a3655846.html
14. https://www.elitedaily.com/p/why-did-queen-elizabeth-meet-donald-trump-alone-two-royals-reportedly-refused-to-attend-9768125
15. From interview with Brad Parscale, 2019.
16. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/donald-trump-arrives-britain-state-visit-n1013041
21
MELANIA’S REVENGE
“The problem is they’re writing history and it’s not correct.”
—MELANIA TRUMP TO SEAN HANNITY1
As in the case of her husband, Donald Trump, the first lady, Melania Trump, did not come to the White House via a traditional path. Most first ladies arrive as the wife of a politician or a general. The latter was often synonymous with the former, for it takes great people skills to rise to the top in the military. Melania was the wife of a businessman and was herself a career woman with dreams and plans and products she launched.
Melania was born and raised in Slovenia, an enchanting, small country in the Balkans, with a narrow, tentative link to the Adriatic coast, which they proudly celebrate. Its capital city, Ljubljana, has a castle on a hilltop in its center. Melania is only the second first lady in history to be born outside of the United States, the other being Louisa Catherine Johnson, the wife of the sixth president, John Quincy Adams. Louisa Catherine was born in London.2
The Slovenia that Melania knew as a child was a part of Yugoslavia, a Communist country that walked a high wire between the two towering Communist nations, the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China. I visited Ljubljana on several occasions and tried to pick up on some of the unique culture and customs.
Slovenia was an atheist state at the time of Melania’s birth on April 26, 1970. Posters of the Yugoslavian dictator, Josip Tito, were everywhere.3 There were no Christmas trees, although it was permissible to buy a “New Year’s tree.” Easter was known and sometimes practiced quietly at home but not by persons in prominent positions. The director or foreman at a factory, for example, could lose his job over such carelessness. Still, it was an improvement on life in the Soviet Union, where both Christmas and Easter were strictly forbidden. In the seventies, schoolteachers often teased their children to find out which families might be privately practicing Christianity at home. If discovered, they would be reported to the state. The day after Easter, a teacher might ask the classroom, “Children, did anyone have any special cakes or food yesterday?” The Christian could be ferreted out and the family identified. In a Communist country, one learned to keep one’s mouth shut. Especially in front of children.
Melania’s father, Viktor Knavs, was a member of the League of Communists of Slovenia, but he nonetheless, arranged for Melania to be secretly baptized as a Roman Catholic. After Jacqueline Kennedy, she is the second first lady in American history to practice the Catholic faith, although several presidential daughters have been Catholic.
Life in a totalitarian state, where neighbor often spied on neighbor, and each block had its own political monitor, may have prepared Melania for the vicious political and media attacks that have come her way as first lady. They also give her a perspective on America that no other first lady has ever had.
Growing up in Slovenia, Melania saw the United States as a place where anything was possible. In America, “your dreams could come true,” she said. “You could do a lot of things. Whatever you decide to do.”4
Melania Trump speaks six languages fluently: English, Slovene, Serbo-Croatian, Italian, German, and French. In addition, White House sources told me that she can conduct simple conversations in many other languages.5
She has worked as a model in Milan, Italy, and Paris, even living for years in an apartment there. The media predictably ignored this story, but when she made her second trip to France as first lady, she was captured on television speaking French to the people of that country, and it made an indelible impression. My wife, who is French, was at home visiting her family when she saw the first lady on French television and heard the people of her tiny village exclaim with pride that the American first lady could speak their language.
Predictably, journalists and academics have expressed skepticism about the first lady’s linguistic talents. They apparently fear it is a credit to her intelligence. Mastering such diverse languages—Slavic languages, Latin languages an
d then German and English, which are connected to neither of the former language families—does show remarkable skill and further provides Melania Trump with an understanding that no other first ladies have had. Federico Fellini once said, “A different language is a different vision of life.”6
WHAT KIND OF FIRST LADY?
In 1999, when business tycoon Donald Trump was talking about running for president, his girlfriend, Melania Knavs, was asked by an ABC News reporter, Don Dahler, if she could picture herself as first lady. “Yes,” she answered, saying that she would support Donald Trump and stand by him.
What kind of first lady would she be?
“I would be very traditional, like Jackie Kennedy and Betty Ford,” she said.7
Melania Knavs Trump is not the only first lady to have developed an independent career of her own before coming to the White House. Lady Bird Johnson was a successful businesswoman who ran companies, including media properties. When her husband died, she ran them alone, with her daughters. Nancy Reagan had been an accomplished actress. Hillary Rodham Clinton was a lawyer. Laura Bush was a librarian. Nevertheless, Melania Trump comes to the White House with a unique set of skills. As a fashion model she learned how to look, how to dress, how to obscure her own personal feelings and project confidence. She brought to the White House something that every first lady desires to project: poise and elegance.
Some say that the role of first lady should be changing because the role of women is changing. And thus a first lady who deals only with ceremonial and domestic chores is diminished when compared with a career woman, one who enters public life on her own merits, with her own political ambitions.
This is a thorny business. A president’s wife is not elected. The German people voted for Angela Merkel as their leader. Should her husband serve as a co-leader? Is he diminished as a man if he does not assert himself in her government?
When Bill Clinton said, “You get two for the price of one,” meaning that Hillary was going to help him run the country, it was not well received. Hillary eventually had to establish her own identity and political success, separate from him.
The modern role of first lady is further complicated by the fact that it has grown in responsibility. In the United Kingdom, there is a monarch. In France, and in many other nations, there is a prime minister who runs the government day to day, giving its president greater freedom to fill the ceremonial role. In the United States both responsibilities fall on the shoulders of the president. This is where first ladies can play a critical role.
Add to that discussion the fact that many first ladies have also been mothers of small children. It was a role that Jackie Kennedy played and that Michelle Obama performed as well. It is a role that Melania Trump, with her devotion to her son Barron, has made preeminent. She is devoted to the upbringing of her son and defies any criticism of that role.
It has been my humble privilege to work with six of our American first ladies. I co-chaired a charity event with Lady Bird Johnson, who was efficient and businesslike. I did the same in an East Room reception with Rosalynn Carter. She was bright and passionate. I co-chaired four events with Nancy Reagan, three in the White House, one afterward. She was a strong lady and one of impeccable taste and a sense for public relations. I co-chaired a charity event with George and Barbara Bush, with whom I later developed a long friendship. Barbara was a passionate reader who turned something she enjoyed into a cause. And later I co-chaired a charity event with George W. and Laura Bush. Some of these events involved many weeks of planning and preparation, and in the case of the Reagans, a chance to get to know them.
One can appreciate Melania Trump’s wisdom by her choice of causes. Lady Bird was ridiculed for ignoring the plight of the poor and making her cause the spread of wildflowers along American highways. Nancy Reagan was laughed at for being naive, telling drug users, “Just say no.” Both Barbara and Laura Bush were criticized for making literacy their cause, when there were so many life-and-death issues. But while the media despised the new President Trump, and so were prepared to reject his first lady, they could hardly knock her cause.
When Melania Trump launched her “Be Best” campaign, taking up the issue of internet bullying of children, the media turned their ferocity on her, claiming that her husband was the biggest internet bully of them all. How dare she speak out on this issue?
The first lady responded with grace. In March, 2018 she slipped into a White House roundtable meeting with technology executives, dropping the comment, “I am well aware that people are skeptical of me discussing this topic…. But it will not stop me from doing what I know is right.”8
Meanwhile, the wisdom of Melania Trump’s choice of a cause became increasingly apparent. How could the media attack her issue of cyberbullying without proving her point?
MELANIA AND A HOSTILE MEDIA
Even in 1999, the media seemed to be seeking to divide the couple, asking questions about Melania’s motives in their relationship and then invoking Donald’s controversial lifestyle. “They don’t know me,” Melania said of the critics then, describing Donald Trump as “very kind” and “very charming.”9
A reporter asked her at the time if she was “in love” with Donald Trump. Yes, Melania said.
She seemed to know instinctively that the media was something with which she would have to live. “I like to have my private life, too. Yes, but I’m always open. I’m not shy of the media. I’m not shy about the camera. That’s my business. That’s my modeling career. But it sometimes could be very tricky and unpleasant, unfair.”10
In this interview, twenty years ago, the future first lady was already showing signs of wariness about journalists. She talked about being “misquoted” in past stories. Even then, Melania was using her poise and her beauty to deflect questions that could have stirred controversy. “Media can be very tricky sometimes,” she said. “You need to be very careful.”11
What kind of president would Donald Trump make? “He would be a great leader,” Melania said. She thought his business skills would work to his advantage.12
Don Jr. sees the recent attacks on the first lady as a means to hurt the president. It is shades of the old movie plot in which the villain realizes that he can’t break the hero so he turns his wrath on the hero’s family. “Give me what I want or I will hurt the person you love.”
“Most of the attacks on her are just to hurt him,” Don Jr. said to me. “Since they can’t break him, they turn their guns on her, someone who is innocent. So maybe he can take it, but does he really want to see her get hurt by this, too?
“At first you got some ludicrous stories. ‘Oh my God, she is being held captive in the White House.’ They were giving her a chance. ‘Denounce your husband and we will go easy on you, we won’t blame you. It’s not your fault.’
“The problem with that approach is that they in fact have a very good relationship. They always have had a good relationship. So when the media realized that they couldn’t divide them, they turned on her with a vengeance.”13
Lara Trump is equally sanguine about the first lady. “She’s an incredibly smart woman, and people don’t give her nearly enough credit. When you look at the past first ladies, there is a totally different standard. The media criticism is so overdone that it actually backfires.”14
White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham fought back with an op-ed. Responding to a historian’s criticism of the first lady, she pointed out that Melania had recently “hosted a successful state dinner and dozens of holiday events at the White House. She has led restoration and preservation efforts in the residence. She has welcomed numerous foreign heads of state to the White House. And, most recently, she has represented the country at a state funeral.”15
Grisham followed with a credible list of work the first lady had accomplished, trips she had made to suffering Americans and troubled children, victims of hurricanes and flooding, and the families of victims of school shootings. Where there has been pain in this country, the
first lady has been the first on the scene.16
While the president respects his wife’s independence and does not often publicly wade into the media’s treatment of her, he is surely aware of what they are doing. We got into a discussion about it during our lunch. President Trump and I were talking about the comparisons between himself and President Andrew Jackson, when Jackson’s wife, Rachel, came up.
“Tell me about her,” Donald Trump said.
“Well, you know the story?” I asked.
“Tell me,” he insisted. I got the very clear impression that he knew the story full well but still wanted my version. This was one of those occasions I had been hearing about. I had been told that Donald Trump could be a patient listener. Jared Kushner had talked about the meeting with President Xi at Mar-a-Lago, when President Trump had asked questions and then listened for the longest time to stories about Chinese history.
So I told Donald Trump the story. Rachel Jackson’s first husband had disappeared and after many years was declared dead. She had subsequently remarried, this time to Andrew Jackson. But years later, when the presidential election heated up, it was learned that her first husband, while deceased, had actually been alive at the time of her second marriage.
Newspapers had a field day. Rachel Jackson was blasted as an adulterer and a bigamist.
Fortunately, she knew nothing about it. She was protected at the Jackson homestead, the Hermitage, carefully shielded from the political carnage. When Andrew Jackson won the election of 1828 and was the nation’s president-elect, Rachel and her lady friends made the joyous trek into Nashville to buy a new dress for the inaugural ball.