The first lady of the United States has skyrocketed in popularity and far surpasses that of her criticized husband. This is the story of the inexpressive woman who has slowly won the hearts of a skeptical country.
“I am an immigrant,” Melania Trump declared on November 1 of last year, during a speech she gave in the state of Pennsylvania to support her husband's campaign for the presidency. “No one values the freedom and opportunities of the United States as much as I do,” she added. A little more than two months later, on January 20 of this year, Mrs. Trump arrived with her husband in Washington for his inauguration as president.
In front of the United States Capitol, Donald Trump swore to defend the constitution of his country and fulfill his duties as head of state. The New York magnate took his oath with his hand on a pair of Bibles: one that his mother had given him in 1955 and another on which Abraham Lincoln had sworn 156 years earlier. His wife, standing next to their son Barron Trump, held them. At that moment, he became the 45th President of the United States and she the First Lady.
The country had, for the second time in its history, a First Lady who was not American by birth. The first had been the British Louisa Adams, wife of John Quincey Adams, who held the office from 1825 to 1829. Like Adams, Mrs. Trump had arrived in the United States as an adult, at the age of 25. It was 1995 and she came from Italy, where she worked as a model. Her homeland was, however, Slovenia.
Melanija Knavs, as her name is written in Slovenian, was born in 1970 in Novo Mesto, a small town that looks like an island because the Krka River borders it almost entirely. At that time, Slovenia belonged to the former Yugoslavia. Melania Knauss – her name translates into English – grew up in the town of Sevnica, under the dictatorship of Marshal Tito. There she lived with her parents, Viktor and Amalija Knauss, and sister Ines. Her father, Viktor, was a member of the Communist Party.
In the 1980s, after the death of Marshal Tito, ethnic, economic and political conflicts intensified in Yugoslavia, and the republic gradually began to disintegrate. At the same time, as a teenager, young Melania dreamed of being a model. However, before her aspirations could have any chance, the disintegration of Yugoslavia in 1991 was necessary, which gave Slovenia its independence.
In 1992, Slovenian women's magazine Jana launched a “Look of the Year” competition, inviting young Slovenian women to enter the world of fashion, catwalks and modelling, to be part of a world that had previously been closed to Slovenians. The prize for the competition was to enter European modelling. The young, single Melania Knauss entered the competition, won and gradually began working as a model. She also studied architecture and design for a year at the University of Ljubljana.
Initially, she worked in her home country, in print and television advertising. Later, Paris and Vienna, but especially Milan, came onto her radar. She gained more prestige and specialised in modelling for jewellery. In the midst of this rising career, in 1995, Knauss met Paolo Zampolli, an Italian modelling entrepreneur. Through him, at the age of twenty-five, the young Slovenian woman went to live in the United States in 1996.
She settled in New York. To do so, the government gave her an H-1B visa, which allowed her to work as a model. This type of visa, which years later her future husband would claim only served to replace American labor with foreign labor, was given to people with special or high-level skills and abilities. The talent of the current First Lady has allowed her to be on the cover of magazines such as Vogue, Ocean Drive, Avenue and Harper's Baazar, in addition to being photographed by photographers of the stature of Helmut Newton.
With her career already established, in 1998 Paolo Zampolli invited the model Knauss to a party at the Kit Kat Club in New York. The event was organized by Donald Trump, then just a real estate magnate. It was then that they met. A few months later, they began dating. In January 1999, the New York Times reported that Trump and Knauss had met at a movie theater watching the film Elizabeth, about Queen Elizabeth I of England.
Months later, in November of the same year, the same newspaper began to speculate that, if Donald Trump ran for president, the model could be his First Lady. The 2000 elections were the first in which the businessman began to approach the idea of being president. As is known, he was not an official candidate and in 2001 George W. Bush was sworn in. But that same year, the now thirty-something Melania Knauss obtained her residency. She was now Trump's girlfriend.
Three years later, in 2004, the couple became engaged. They married in 2005, at a wedding attended by, among others, Bill and Hillary Clinton. A year later their only son, Barron, was born and Mrs. Trump became an American citizen. Since the wedding, she has also increased her philanthropic activity and has been linked to works related to children's issues. In 2005, the American Red Cross named her a goodwill ambassador, to which she has contributed for several years. And in 2010, Melania Trump became an entrepreneur and launched her own jewelry line.
She continued this way until mid-2015, when her husband announced himself as a Republican Party candidate for the presidential elections. She began to participate in the campaign, although discreetly and with few public appearances. Her husband's statements attracted the most attention, since, among other things, they proposed ideas such as building a wall between Mexico and the United States to prevent illegal immigration. In addition, they directed derogatory messages against groups such as Latinos, Muslims, refugees or women.
Among those few appearances, the one she made during the Republican convention that made her husband's candidacy official is especially memorable. On this occasion, Mrs. Trump gave a speech that was later accused of being plagiarized from one given by Michelle Obama. It was also a rarity when she appeared the week before the election, when she affirmed herself as an immigrant and thanked the United States for the opportunities it had given her.
In both speeches, her voice felt foreign, with a non-native accent, but at the same time, with a great understanding of the language she used to speak. Her voice is impregnated with many other voices, since Melania Trump is perhaps the First Lady who has spoken the most languages: Slovenian, French, Serbian, German and English.
Thus, after being sworn in as President, Melania Trump's husband dared to say alongside her: "From today on, a new vision will govern our land. From this day on, it will only be America first, America first." Melania Trump listened in silence, along with her son, from the chair she had been able to reach before that new vision took over.
A few days ago, Google revealed that one of the main searches by Americans has been the question Why is Melania Trump always sad? Her almost immovable face and the lack of euphoria she has had at transcendental moments such as her husband's inauguration or the presidential couple's first dance generate an almost worldwide curiosity.
During the first months of her life as first lady, Melania did not appear at official events. And in fact, during the first months she did not even live in the White House. The first lady has starred in controversial moments, many due to the eccentricities of the Trump family. She attended the Texas floods in heels, displayed lavish Christmas decorations and kept the attention of the tabloid press with all the rumors about her past. However, her silence and her prudence in the face of the major issues in the United States have not allowed these issues to go beyond gossip. In December, a Gallup survey revealed that Melania is liked by Americans because she has a popularity of almost 60 percent, a figure similar to the unfavorable image of her husband.
Even though circumstances change, Melania's face always remains just as expressionless. A comprehensive photo report by the Huffington Post shows that Melania's face has remained that way for the past 18 years. Many are wondering why the woman who in other times would be considered one of the luckiest women in the world is not smiling.
