Scots actress who joined the inner circle
JUST a few months ago she was forced into an embarrassing apology after being accused of fabricating a racist memoir about her gap year in Zambia.
Louise Linton became a global laughing stock when her ill-judged book, in which she described herself as a ‘skinny white muzungu with long angel hair’, was published.
But the Scottish actress appears to have put the humiliation behind her and has now been initiated into Donald Trump’s inner circle.
Wearing a conservative purple tailored dress and jacket, and with a stoic expression on her face, the immaculate 36-year-old this week held a Bible in her perfectly manicured hands as her fiancé was sworn in as the US Treasury Secretary.
Standing in the Oval Office just a few feet from President Trump, she gazed into the eyes of her husband-to-be, Steven Mnuchin, as he pledged allegiance to his country.
Mr Mnuchin, a multi-millionaire banker and movie bankroller, had served as Mr Trump’s finance director during the Presidential election campaign. It has been a remarkable turnaround for Miss Linton, who appeared to have withdrawn from public life after #LintonLies went viral last year on Twitter.
The actress, who grew up in the magnificent Melville Castle near Edinburgh, later withdrew her book In Congo’s Shadow: One Girl’s Perilous Journey to the Heart of Africa from the market.
She was accused of having a ‘white saviour complex’ after enraged readers pointed out a number of inaccuracies in what was billed as ‘the inspiring memoir of an intrepid teenager who abandoned her privileged life in Scotland’. The 290-page book included claims that armed rebels descended on the village where Miss Linton, only 18 years old at the time, was staying. But the account has been questioned by readers in Africa who cannot recall any such incident in the area.
The actress, who was educated at Tony Blair’s old public school Fettes College, was also ridiculed for claiming Zambia had monsoons and 12-inch spiders.
Miss Linton, who had a small role in the 2007 film Lions for Lambs, later wrote on Twitter: ‘I am genuinely dismayed and very sorry to see that I have offended people as this was the very opposite of my intent.’
She has since closed her public Twitter and Facebook accounts.