The image is stark. It radiates intent.
Standing tall in a sharply tailored pantsuit and a pristine white shirt, the new First Lady stares down the camera. Her perfectly manicured fingers rest on the highly polished table of the Yellow Oval Room. The Washington Monument her towering backdrop and a singular message: Melania is back and this time she means business.
Yet within days of the White House releasing this official portrait – captured one day after her husband’s inauguration – Melania seemed to all but disappear.
She wasn’t at the Super Bowl when Trump became the first sitting president to attend the championship football game on February 9. Instead, it was first daughter Ivanka Trump who boarded Air Force One to New Orleans with the president and stood with him during the game.
Melania has also been missing from high-profile White House events, such as Trump signing his first piece of legislation into law, The Laken Riley Act.
And she’s been a no show when he’s greeted various foreign leaders who’ve visited recently – including Ukrainian President Zelensky, whose frosty Oval Office head-to-head with Trump and Vice President JD Vance made headlines last week.
Her official FLOTUS Instagram account has just three posts and her new East Wing staff remains small – less than a dozen people.
She is yet to hire a social secretary, one of the most prominent positions in an administration.
Within days of the White House releasing this official portrait (pictured) – captured one day after her husband’s inauguration – Melania seemed to all but disappear.
Melania wasn’t at the Super Bowl when Trump became the first sitting president to attend the championship football game on February 9.
But now, finally, on Monday afternoon, she is scheduled to hold her first solo event as the newly minted First Lady. She will be on Capitol Hill supporting the ‘TAKE IT DOWN’ act – aimed at protecting Americans from deepfake and revenge pornography.
It will mark her latest foray into public duties, and her first since January 24, when she joined President Trump on visits to North Carolina (devastated by Hurricane Helen last September) and Los Angeles (in the aftermath of the wildfires).
All of which begs the question: could it be that Melania has been quietly positioning herself as a FLOTUS in absentia, much as she was during her husband’s first term?
The jury is still out on that. But the President perhaps gave us a clue about what has been keeping his wife busy when she was by his side on February 22 at the National Governors’ Association Dinner at the White House – the last time Melania was seen in public.
The President told guests that Melania – uber glamorous in a Dolce & Gabbana tuxedo and towering heels – took the lead in preparing for the black-tie dinner in the chandeliered gilt and splendor of the East Room.
‘Let me begin by expressing our gratitude to the First Lady of the United States for hosting the dinner,’ he said as the room burst into applause.
‘She worked very hard on making sure everything was beautiful. She’s very good at that… Thank you for doing such a great job, honey. Really great. Really beautiful.’
But, aside from party planning, what else has Melania been up to in the interim?
Insiders say her priority this past month has been her son Barron.
He was just 10 years old when his father was elected president first time round. Then, Melania famously spent much of her time living at Trump Tower, her base when in New York, and delayed her move to Washington to allow Barron to finish his school year in the city.
Now 18, Barron is a Freshman at New York University and has a 24/7 Secret Service detail which means he’s likely struggling to have a normal college experience.
Melania, who is understood to have spent much of her time in recent weeks back in New York with Barron, has acknowledged that her son is not like other teenagers.
‘I don’t think it’s possible for him to be a normal student. His experience at college — it’s very different than any other kid,’ she said in December.
Her other pre-occupation has been an Amazon documentary about her life, scheduled for release later this year.
When Jeff Bezos was at the Trumps’ Palm Beach residence, Mar-a-Lago, in December to celebrate the election victory, Melania took advantage of the opportunity to pitch her documentary idea, according to reports in the Wall Street Journal.
It must have been one hell of a pitch. Amazon reportedly agreed to pay $40 million to license the film and Melania’s cut is an estimated 70 per cent, meaning she’s set to benefit to the tune of at least $28 million.
The film crew has had unfettered access, joining Melania as she packed up Mar-a-Lago for the move to DC and even getting access to the Trumps’ residential quarters in the White House.
Lexye Aversa, a longtime Mar-a-Lago member and events planner, told the Daily Mail that she saw the crew at the Palm Beach club in the early part of the year, before the Inauguration.
‘They were everywhere. We had to walk around the other way because they were filming,’ she said, adding that it was ‘really cool’ to see and that Melania looked ‘regal.’
Household staff signed waivers and the whole venture apparently left the Secret Service nervous.
Melania’s ‘disappearance’ after those January 24 visits to North Carolina and LA was apparently due in part to continued filming commitments. In fact, the documentary crew had travelled with her on Air Force One, filming the First Lady in the disaster areas.
And at the end of the California leg, Melania split off to focus on finishing the documentary instead of accompanying her husband to Mar-a-Lago.
Filming wrapped in early February and, according to insiders, the First Lady will now resume a more normal schedule of official duties.
She has said she plans to pick up her ‘Be Best’ campaign – focusing on the social, emotional and physical health of children – that she started in Trump’s first term, though details have yet to be released.
Insiders also say Melania has various other projects and events in the works, but nothing is yet ready to be announced. The First Lady is, after all, a woman who plays her cards close to her chest and even more closely controls her image.
During that first Trump term, her East Wing staff would pack her schedule on the days she had agreed to one event – adding social-media videos to be filmed and other public-facing tasks – because on those days, her hair and makeup would be done.
And when it comes to image, there is of course the thorny Vogue question.
Melania’s predecessor Jill Biden graced the cover twice and, as vice-president, Kamala Harris also made the cut.
Hillary Clinton and Michelle Obama were both afforded the honour but Republican first ladies, such as Laura Bush, have been regulated to inside features.
In the first Trump term, Melania was reportedly offered a feature in Vogue but was not guaranteed the cover so is said to have turned it down.
Surely Melania, a former top model and two-times FLOTUS, has now earned the right to the full works?
Amy O’Dell, who wrote ‘Anna: The Biography’ about longtime Vogue Editor-in-Chief Anna Wintour, thinks it’s possible.
‘[Anna] does know how to stir the pot,’ O’Dell told the Daily Mail. ‘And I don’t think it’s a foregone conclusion that she’s not going to feature Melania. I also don’t think anybody knows. Anna is unpredictable.’
Other insiders told the Daily Mail that Wintour, who is believed to be no fan of Donald Trump, has let it be known that she will only extend Melania an invitation under very particular circumstances.
According to one: ‘Something extraordinary would have to happen. If she was going to leave Donald – if there was a hint of divorce – Anna would be first in line for an interview.’
A Vogue spokesperson says ‘cover/editorial plans or speculation around them are never discussed’.
In the meantime, Melania has had to settle for the cover of Hello magazine in glossy black-and-white photos taken at an airport outside New York a few days after the California trip, by a photographer she knows and trusts.
Who needs Vogue seemed to be the message!
After Monday’s scheduled appearance, we can certainly expect to see more of Melania in the coming days.
She and her East Wing staff have been preparing for the reopening of public tours of the White House, which resumed last week after closure for the transition process.
Photographs of the first couple have been hung along the tour route – many of them from the first Trump term.
And she’ll also be in the House Chamber on Tuesday, March 4, when President Trump delivers an unofficial ‘State of the Union’ address. She’s been working on her guest list for the first lady’s box, preparing to fill it with A-list Trump supporters.
When it comes to Melania, you can be certain of one thing. When she is present, she makes sure that presence counts.
