Silent Melania Trump nears end of her husband’s tumultuous tenure

“It’s not the first time she’s heard of what he was doing because he tweeted it before telling her,” said the source, who downplayed the importance of the first lady receives information on what is apparently his schedule too, depending on Trump’s mood. That day.

Staff, like many, were clear that the event with the tweet did not elicit their sympathy for the first lady.

“She is part of it. She may be quiet, but she is part of it,” the source said.

“This” being the president’s recent activities, the denial of his loss, complicity in inciting inflamed supporters with lies and conspiracy theories, and the abject abdication of an official role. The outgoing first lady has done nothing of importance as the weeks of her tenure come to an end. She didn’t set up an office to continue her platform in the years after the White House, according to a source familiar with her activities. She also didn’t help fit incoming first lady Jill Biden – who she still hasn’t made contact with, the source said.

The only thing Trump has done, besides packing the White House, working on photo albums from his time as First Lady, and overseeing photoshoots for carpet and decor items, is make a convoluted statement on the events of last Wednesday, five days after they took place.

“There has never been a first lady as stubborn and defiant as Melania Trump,” says Kate Andersen Brower, author of “First Women: The Grace and Power of America’s Modern First Ladies”. “I think she’s digging. I think she’s channeled her husband’s fury and obviously isn’t interested in playing the traditional role of a first lady who, in times of crisis, seeks to unite and appease the country. ”

Instead, she stood by the president’s side, something she hasn’t always done before during times of turmoil. In his Monday morning statement, Trump did not mention her husband’s name, nor did he say he should be given an iota of responsibility for the insurgency.

Instead, she seemed to bring up parts of old statements and speeches in this new one, and added in a paragraph painting herself as a victim of continued criticism from a former staff member. Trump’s reclusive character has at times stirred public curiosity about his alignment with the president, particularly when he is criticized. Her helping hands, steel-eyed face, and frequent outbursts of independent opinion crafted a possible scenario for her husband’s criticism that maybe she wasn’t like him, or even, didn’t. didn’t like him.

But if the past few weeks have proven anything, it’s that she’s more aligned with the president than most would assume.

“She understands her husband and what he stands for, and that just doesn’t bother her,” Brower said. “She is not a victim and she will not leave the White House to apologize for her husband’s behavior.”

Trump “ is not sad to leave ”

As the president publicly denounced the election, fraudulently claiming it was rigged and clinging to the false hope of staying in the White House, his wife was packing her bags to move, say multiple sources who have observed Trump’s activities since. End of november.

The first lady now has more than half the job of shipping personal effects to Mar-a-Lago or storage, having gradually overseen the move for weeks. Staff at the residence had to help with the semi-clandestine operation, facilitating the logistics of packing without angering the president, who genuinely believed he would stay put.

Residence staff members remain in their roles, often across multiple administrations. It doesn’t matter who the president is, it only matters that they represent the US presidency.

“They are the most patriotic people I have ever met,” said Brower, whose first book was “The Residence: Into the Private World of the White House.” “They continued the movement, but had to make an undercover part of it because they don’t want to upset (President) Trump.”

Melania Trump’s opportunity to prepare and prepare to leave also indicates her desire to end Washington and the past four years of dramatic ups and downs.

“(Melania Trump) is not sad to be leaving,” said a White House official familiar with Trump’s mood.

It’s a place where she differs from her husband – he desperately wants to stay, she’s cool to go.

“Pat Nixon is the most recent example I can think of of a first lady who compares herself at all to Melania Trump,” Brower said, but perhaps only in the circumstances, not in action.

“While Watergate was raging, Pat Nixon spent a lot of time confined in her room alone in the residence. The butlers brought her breakfast and often she drank only the coffee. People around her worried about her health because it was obvious that Watergate was taking a toll and she was losing weight, ”said the author.

Bucking tradition

Those who have rubbed shoulders with Trump over the past two weeks have not noticed a change in behavior towards isolation and sadness, in fact it was Trump’s lack of emotional connectivity with the terrifying riots that unfolded live. on television, and his lack of desire to broadcast an immediate message. respond to or condemn the real-time violence, which prompted two of its longest-serving employees to submit their resignations with immediate effect, sources say.

Usually the first lady of a single-term president comes publicly to his side. President Ford has served less than a full term and Betty Ford stepped in to read his concession letter to Carter when he lost in 1976 “said Brower.

On Wednesday, an announcement was made that Blair House, the historic official White House guesthouse where several presidents (including Trump) spent the night before they were sworn in, would also welcome Biden. CNN has previously reported that Biden, yet without an invitation from the President and First Lady of Blair House, intended to stay at a hotel the day before the opening.

But the invitation was not sent at the insistence of Melania Trump.

“She has nothing to do with it,” the staff member said. The invitation may have read “White House,” but it was issued through the State Department, whose Office of the Chief of Protocol oversees the management of Blair House.