Unmasked Marriage

With President Trump’s relationship under a microscope, friends finally open up

What’s Donald and Melania Trump’s relationship really like? Friends reveal the truth about the first couple’s private life.

As he walked beside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on a Tel Aviv airport tarmac on May 22, President Donald Trump took a moment to reach for wife Melania’s hand. What she did next went viral: The first lady appeared to swat her husband’s hand away. The next day, on the steps of Air Force One in Rome, she again avoided The Donald’s attempt to hold hands during their eight-day tour of five countries, moving her arm to fix her hair at the precise moment he reached for her.

Those two public moments have the world questioning the state of the Trumps’ marriage. But they’re not the first eyebrow-raising interactions between husband and wife since Donald, 70, took office. Tongues wagged when the president-elect left Melania, 47, standing by their SUV as he greeted President Barack and Michelle Obama at the White House on Inauguration Day. Hours later on Jan. 20, Melania was caught on camera beaming as Donald looked at her, but scowling as soon as he turned his back. Now Life & Style has spoken with friends who’ve known the couple for decades to uncover the truth about their marriage. “It’s challenging for Melania, most likely, to be thrown into this new role. To be first lady is not

something to take lightly,” longtime pal Federico Pignatelli tells Life & Style. “She wants to be there for him. She will do what a first lady needs to do. [But] I know that she has to get adjusted “I’m not a nagging wife.” — Melania to all these changes, and she’s seeing her husband far less because he’s so busy doing what he needs to do.”

EARLY ISSUES

The president has fervent supporters and passionate detractors. But no one would call him mellow. “Donald is an opinionated person. He can be maybe not the easiest person at times,” says Federico, who has known the pair since the beginning of their relationship. Melania, who was spotted locking palms with

“We have a very, very pretty much equal relationship.” — Donald on Melania

Donald at other occasions during their May overseas trip, “has always been a calming factor, though. They’re a beautiful couple.”

But neither Donald nor Melania was ready for a serious romance when they met in 1998. Donald spotted Slovenian model Melania Knauss at NYC’S Kit Kat Club while he was on a date with another woman, Norwegian cosmetics heiress Celina Midelfart. He asked for Melania’s number, but she wouldn’t give it up, unimpressed by his hitting on her mid-date with Celina, now 44. Instead, Melania got the businessman’s phone number and waited a week to call. “At the beginning, I didn’t think Donald was super serious about the relationship,” notes Federico. “Melania was a very

beautiful woman, very elegant, but my impression was he was not taking it as seriously as it became.”

Melania must’ve agreed. The duo split briefly in 2000, with her former roommate Matthew Atanian explaining that she “had some trust issues with him.” By 2004, however, Donald had popped the question and they tied the

knot in front of a sea of famous faces (including Bill and Hillary Clinton, Sean “Diddy” Combs and Billy Joel) at his Mar-a-lago estate in Palm Beach, Fla., in 2005. “I think that she literally conquered him with time, with patience, with being smart,” says Federico. “He’s a man that already had kids and ex-wives and so on. So he didn’t have an urge to have a family, I would say.”

DONALD BEING DONALD

But he got one: They’re now proud parents of 11-yearold son Barron. Since Donald’s been in Washington, D.C., Melania has been living with Barron in NYC until he finishes the school year. So the couple have been apart, for up to 12 days at a time. Oddly, even when the president visited NYC in early May, he chose to sleep at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, N.J., rather than with Melania in the family penthouse at Trump Tower. It left many people surprised, but the president insisted he wanted to avoid causing a “big disruption” in NYC. Melania wasn’t complaining. “She is very committed to the family,” friend Paolo Zampolli, who hosted the 1998 party where the duo met, tells Life & Style. “She’s very engaged with Barron, and she’s been that way since day one.”

That’s the way Donald likes it. “I mean, I won’t do anything to take care of them,” the father of five children by three wives once said, explaining his parenting philosophy.

Changing diapers? Out of the question. “I’ll supply funds and she’ll take care of the kids,” he said. “It’s not like I’m gonna be walking the kids down Central Park.”

His hands- off parenting isn’t the only quirk Melania’s had to work around. Though Donald’s become the world’s most famous tweeter, as of two years ago he could barely type and didn’t even have a work computer, Billy Procida, former vice president of the Trump Organization, tells Life & Style. Billy (now the president of Procida Funding & Advisors), who’s known as being Trump’s original apprentice, doesn’t believe that affects his ability to lead, though. “He doesn’t drink and smoke. All he does is work,” he says. “He’s a workaholic. His hobby is work. This guy has two things he does: work and family.”

NO TROPHY WIFE

Balancing the two is a struggle for anyone, let alone the president. But his friends insist the demands of the job haven’t changed the way he feels about his wife. He’s never been shy about his attraction to Melania, calling her “my supermodel” and bragging about her being cellulite-free and “terrific in bed.” “When I saw them at Mar-a-lago on New Year’s Eve, they looked like they were on their first date,” says friend Paolo, who also spent Easter at the White House with the pair. “They were very close to each other. You can see the chemistry.”

But Melania isn’t interested in just being arm candy. “I think Melania’s always been herself around him, and that’s why they’ve been together 20 years,” adds Paolo, founder of ID Models. “Melania is very opinionated, and Mr. President also listens a lot to her. I think he does consider, at the highest level, Melania’s opinion.”

That doesn’t surprise New York–based psychologist Jeff Gardere, who does not treat the Trumps. “I don’t think Melania got to being first lady by accident. Some people might think that it’s all about her looks; I think it’s much more about perseverance and intelligence. You have to be an extremely strong person to be able to live with and be married to a personality such as Donald Trump.”