Khaki military jacket, golden buttons, wide epaulets and a tight belt at the waist: the outfit worn by Melania Trump at the Republican convention in August stood out with her warm speech.
This style of dress has become a habit among the first American lady, notes Kate Bennett.
The CNN reporter, the only one to cover the First Lady full-time, posted “Free, Melania”, an unauthorized biography.
“Melania Trump went from a glamorous look to this image of a little administration soldier, a protected first lady, in armor, a private person who does not want to bring anyone in.
"
Often obscured by sunglasses, the gaze of Melania Trump, who turned 50 in April, seems impenetrable.
This 100% controlled image of a cold woman, reserved or even on the defensive, is partly explained by the narrowness of the circle that surrounds her.
While Donald Trump has an army of advisers, some of whom are leaking and stabbing in the back, his wife, she has few friends and only trusts a handful of collaborators, all faithful.
Like her, they speak little to the press, except to say banalities.
Difficult, therefore, to humanize a character who blocks all communication.
The media have long interpreted these trappings as proof that Melania Trump would live in isolation in the White House.
Yet she is far from being the most unhappy of the first ladies.
“Melania is not alone, she is autonomous.
People think that she is sad and that she feels stuck, but it is not the case ”, nuance, in the Washington Post, Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, a longtime ex-friend who has just released a book assassin on the First Lady.
She paints the portrait of an independent woman who has full confidence in herself and puts her interests first, to the point of having betrayed their friendship.
The Trump couple, here with their son Barron (14), are not traditional: they don't care about Valentine's Day and stay separate./Reuters/Sarah Silbiger
“At the start of Donald Trump's mandate, there was this hashtag #FreeMelania (
Editor's note: Free Melania
) on social networks which claimed that she was locked up and that she was sending signals from the White House, mocks Kate Bennett , interviewed by the Parisian - Today in France.
My theory is the opposite: she is perhaps the freest American first lady in modern history.
"
Melania Trump is not accountable to anyone.
From January 2017, she refused to follow her husband to the White House.
Their son Barron, then aged 10, must finish his school year in New York, she explains.
According to her ex-confidante Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, she would also have waited for work to be done in the bathroom: no question of using the same toilet and shower as Michelle Obama.
A third reason was advanced by another journalist, Mary Jordan, author of a book, "The Art of Her Deal: The Untold Story of Melania Trump" ("Her Art of Negotiation: The Untold Story of Melania Trump »): She would have used her absence as a means of pressure to renegotiate her marriage contract with her billionaire husband.
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Whatever the reason, this late move shows a certain insolence vis-à-vis conventions.
Melania Trump is neither the victim nor the trophy woman the public would want to see.
“Pleasing anyone is not my priority!
Has become his slogan, according to Wolkoff.
"The thing is, she doesn't smile on command," Kate Bennett analyzes.
She doesn't show up where you expect her to and doesn't give a damn about people's opinions.
She has no real desire to be appreciated.
I went to Slovenia, where she was born, to do some research for my book and after two hours in the country, I understood: she is really from Eastern Europe.
Not particularly friendly outside of his close circle.
Not the type to unwrap secrets.
It is the product of its history.
You like me or not, I don't care, that is his mantra.
"
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Melania Knauss was born in 1970 in Novo Mesto, Slovenia, a country which was then part of the former communist Yugoslavia.
Her mother works in a children's clothing factory and her father, a member of the Communist Party, repairs cars.
She began parading at the age of 7 and posing for photographers at 16.
She took architecture lessons at the University of Ljubljana, the capital, but did not graduate.
The young woman then launched into modeling, first in Milan then in Paris, and finally in New York.
She works regularly without becoming a star of the catwalks.
His agents and roommates at the time remember a discreet and hardworking person, with no appetite for the party.
Donald and Melania, who reportedly met in 1998, have been married since 2005./SBM/Picturelux/Bureau233
Her life changes when she meets the New York businessman.
Donald Trump presents her to everyone as a "top model", which is not the case.
“She started to be part of her world and took advantage of the opportunity to build her image as a brand.
And it continues since, “judge Kate Bennett.
Even the story of their meeting in 1998 is questionable.
Trump spots Melania Knauss at a nightclub during Fashion Week.
He is due to meet a supermodel that night but falls under the spell of the 28-year-old Slovenian, who refuses to give him her number.
She finally called him back a few days later.
Little evidence supports this version.
Some sources reported that the two lovers had actually met earlier.
According to Mary Jordan, the Melania Trump myth was made at that time.
She cuts ties with her Slovenian past but also with her friends in New York.
She claims to speak four or five languages fluently, but most of the photographers interviewed by the journalist report that they have only heard her speak English and Slovene.
“Both
(Editor's note: Donald and Melania)
are avid creators of their own history,” wrote Mary Jordan in her book.
"She looks a lot more like him than she looks," adds the journalist.
They are both fighters, survivors, and they put loyalty above all else.
Neither the very public Donald nor the very private Melania has many friends.
Their lonely instincts penetrated until their marriage.
"
She was the one who encouraged him to run in 2016
There is nothing traditional about the Trump couple.
They don't care about Valentine's Day and make a separate room.
When they are in the same building, it is rarely in the same room.
A sort of perfect roommate.
“They get along pretty well,” says Kate Bennett.
They joke together, they have their little jokes that only they can understand.
Do they have the same intimate relationship as most married couples?
No.
Do they have a real bond and a real friendship after twenty years together?
Yes.
She's not the type to try to poison his Diet Coke when his back is turned.
Even politically, "she is much more aligned with Donald Trump than people think."
In 1999, when Donald Trump tried his luck for the first time in the presidential election, she said that she would see herself as the new Jackie Kennedy.
She later supports her husband's conspiracy theory that Barack Obama is not a real American.
She was even the one who encouraged him to run in 2016, says Kate Bennett, “for the simple reason that she couldn't hear him talk about it anymore.
She said to him:
But stop talking about it, do it!
"
Its political influence is not negligible.
When Donald Trump is on the country roads, his wife is the first person he calls to ask her what she thought of the rally.
Melania convinced him to choose Mike Pence as his running mate, a man who she rightly thought would not seek to overshadow her.
And she is actively involved in the campaign for the re-election of the Republican who is set to debate Joe Biden for the first time on Tuesday.
In 2018, the jacket of the first lady, which was inscribed "I Really Don't Care.
From where ?"
("I don't care. How about you?"), Worn during a visit to the children of migrants, had shocked. / Reuters / Kevin Lamarque
Remain First Lady?
This is obviously not a problem.
This does not prevent tensions within the couple.
Melania Trump has been photographed several times dodging her husband's hand.
The infidelity scandals and the accusations of sexual assault to which the latter is the subject obviously did not leave her indifferent: a question of image, again.
"She was in her thirties when they got married," says Kate Bennett.
She knew who she was marrying.
She knew he was not an example of morality.
But it was the life she wanted: security, money, comfort.
I don't think she spent a lot of time in her bedroom crying over her supposed infidelities.
Rather, the resulting public humiliation is the problem.
The Stormy Daniels episode
(Editor's note: the ex-porn star who claimed, in January 2018, to have been paid to keep silent about an affair with Donald Trump)
was particularly tumultuous.
She canceled a trip to Davos where she was to accompany him.
And did not take the same convoy as him to get to Congress during the State of the Union speech.
"
After humiliation, revenge
The visit of Emmanuel and Brigitte Macron, the following spring, was the occasion of a small revenge, recalls the journalist of CNN.
“Melania appeared with a huge white hat.
Result: no one said anything about the president, everyone was talking about the hat.
That day, his message was:
Look at me
.
I spent the day with her and Brigitte Macron and they were very close.
It's as if Brigitte Macron had waved her hand to say:
Go ahead, my beauty!
Take the light, this moment is yours.
Most of the other first ladies would have been offended that Melania was getting all the spotlight.
"
The two women maintained a certain esteem for each other.
After the Notre-Dame fire, Melania Trump sent a letter to Brigitte Macron, in English, to present "her thoughts and prayers for the French people".
She did the same during the Covid-19 pandemic, even as her husband was criticized for his management of the health crisis.
A sign, again, of its independence.
Brigitte Macron and Melania Trump were very close at the G7 summit in Biarritz, in 2019./Reuters/Julien de Rosa
This is coupled with a certain authority.
During the dinner with the spouses at G 7 in Biarritz (Pyrénées-Atlantiques), in August 2019, the American had ostensibly looked at her watch and nodded to her husband.
A few seconds later, Donald did so: the couple left.
“The role of first lady is always quite traditional,” comments Kate Bennett.
Career-educated women like Michelle Obama are expected to give up everything, smile and stand near their husbands waving their hands.
Melania, that's not her thing.
In this sense, we can say that in a way, she is an improbable feminist.
"
