Glitz, glamour and gumption
The Trumps are a first family like no other, writes Will Pavia.
Ayear before he was elected president, Donald Trump hosted an episode of the comedy show Saturday Night Live and played himself in a sketch imagining what the White House would look like if he lived there.
President Trump was busy tweeting out new legislation and Ivanka, his eldest daughter, was secretary for the interior and had been busy covering the Washington Monument in gold mirrored glass.
The scene concluded with a comedienne impersonating his wife, putting on a strong Slovenian accent, placing an arm around Mr Trump and asking Americans to ‘‘dream of Melania for first lady’’. This was the punch line: the audience roared with laughter.
In two months’ time Melania Trump, his third wife, will be the first foreignborn first lady since Louisa Adams, the British wife of John Quincy Adams. She will be the first to have posed nude in the pages of GQ magazine.
Mrs Trump, who like her husband does not drink, has said that she would be ‘‘an advocate for women and for children’’. In her final speech of his campaign she said that she would strive to end bullying on social media. Many wondered if she would start with her husband, who has insulted a multitude of political opponents, journalists and other public figures on Twitter.
With the new first couple will come their 10-year-old son, Barron, seen blinking and rubbing his eyes as his father made his acceptance speech at 3am on Wednesday.
The boy has grown up inside Trump Tower, drinking Frappuccinos from the Starbucks in the lobby and living with his parents and his maternal grandparents. He is said to speak Slovenian – in 2010 when the family appeared on Larry King Live, the host was stunned to hear him speaking with a slight Slovenian accent.
Around this nuclear family spins a wider society of Trumps: the children of two previous marriages. There is Tiffany Trump, 23, his daughter with his second wife, Marla Maples, who grew up with her mother in California. Tiffany spoke briefly for her father at the Republican national convention, but has generally kept a low profile.
Ivanka, 35, is one of three children from his first marriage to Ivana and the apple of her father’s eye. ‘‘She’s six feet tall, she’s got the best body,’’ Mr Trump told the radio host Howard Stern. He has also suggested, more than once, that ‘‘if Ivanka weren’t my daughter, perhaps I’d be dating her’’.
A friend of Chelsea Clinton, Ivanka has backed reforms generally associated with Democrats, such as help with childcare for working mothers. Her siblings, Donald Trump Jr, 38, and Eric Trump, 32, are both biggame hunters. Like Ivanka they are also executives in the Trump Organisation and effectively messengers for their father.
In the second presidential debate, Hillary Clinton named Mr Trump’s children as the thing she admired most about him. Yet their continued presence at the helm of Mr Trump’s businesses, which have debts and licensing deals in foreign countries, will raise unprecedented conflicts of interest.
Donald Trump Jr declared in an interview with George Stephanopoulos on ABC that his father would place his businesses in a blind trust, but admitted that he and his siblings would take charge of the trust. ‘‘It’s not a blind trust if it’s being run by his children,’’ Mr Stephanopoulos remarked, incredulous. Mr Trump Jr said their father would be busy running the country and would not have time to talk to them about business. ‘‘We’re not going to discuss those things,’’ he said. ‘‘Trust me.’’
As for the bombastic 70-year-old man at the centre of it all, friends at his victory party insisted that, in spite of all appearances to the contrary, he was courteous and softly spoken.
The son of a formidable New York property developer, his father’s contacts and political donations are said to have helped Mr Trump to make his way in Manhattan. He is regarded as an adept negotiator and no one now denies his political nous, although many have questioned his ability to focus on policy problems.
Tony Schwartz, who ghost-wrote Mr Trump’s first book, The Art of the Deal, said that the tycoon did not appear able to concentrate for more than 15 minutes and doubted that he had read a novel in his adult life.
He also regarded Mr Trump as thinskinned and liable to persecute his enemies. - New York Times