A new tell-all book about First Lady Melania Trump includes several surprising allegations, including one about how she demanded showers and toilets used by President Barack Obama’s family be replaced before the Trump family moved into the White House. The book, written by Trump’s former senior advisor and close friend Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, also details the icy relationship with President Donald Trump’s eldest daughter, Ivanka Trump. That relationship came to the forefront on Thursday night when a video of Melania scowling at Ivanka went viral.
In Melania and Me: The Rise and Fall of My Friendship with the First Lady, Winston Wolkoff claimed that one reason why Trump stayed in New York City was that she waited for the White House bathrooms to be renovated, reports The U.S. Sun. A book insider told the outlet that Trump “just flat our refused” to move to the White House until it was “completely redesigned and revamped,” adding that Trump “was not prepared to use the same bathroom as the Obamas or anyone else for that matter – it wouldn’t matter if it was the Queen of England.” Trump reportedly believed that as the wife of a president, she did not “expect she should have to make do with second hand or previously used facilities.”
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One of the main themes in Winston Wolkoff’s book is the relationship between Trump and Ivanka. She claims Trump did not want Ivanka’s face to be seen in photos of President Trump taking the oath of office, a plan they called “Operation Block Ivanka.” Another source told Politico Trump was “not a fan of Ivanka trying to make the East Wing a family office.” Another White House source disputed this, though, saying Ivanka “always wanted to be in the policy office of the West Wing between the Domestic Policy Council and the National Economic Council.”
Winston Wolkoff worked as a fashion and society party planner before she was asked to help plan President Trump’s inauguration. She left the White House in February 2018 following a New York Times report about her role in the event. She said the two often had lunch together until a falling out two years ago and no longer speak, reports Politico. Trump’s chief of staff Stephanie Grisham called Winston Wolkoff’s book “wildly self-aggrandizing” and “just not truthful.” The book will be released on Tuesday.
The book includes details on the inauguration planning. She claims President Trump told her to “make it look like North Korea” with “tanks and choppers.” She wrote, “He really wanted goose-stepping troops and armored tanks? That would break tradition and terrify half the country.” White House deputy press secretary Judd Deere called this claim “absolutely not true.” The Apprentice creator Mark Burnett approached the Trumps with the idea of lighting the “sky with drones,” which were not used.
