Melania's disappearing trick

As Donald Trump hogs the spotlight for himself, the first lady has been strangely absent

- Alex Hannaford

At the end of January, after Trump was ensconced in the White House for the second time, NPR reported that his wife, Melania, would be returning to Washington “with significant experience under her belt”. Anita McBride, director of the First Ladies Initiative at American University, told the station that any past perceptions that Melania didn’t want to do that job were “now erased”, and they played a soundbite of the first lady telling a Fox News host that while “some people … see me as just the wife of the president … I’m standing on my own two feet, independent. I have my own thoughts.”

“One thing’s definite,” the NPR host concluded, “the public is going to be seeing more of Melania Trump.”

But, then, we didn’t. Apart from a public sighting of the first lady at Pope Francis’s funeral on the eve of her 55th birthday this weekend, in the first 100 days of Trump’s presidency, Melania Trump has in fact been conspicuous by her absence.

After the pope’s funeral, where the Catholic first lady wore Dolce and Gabbana for the service, complete with a veil, lace gloves and a diamond cross necklace, the couple went their separate ways as soon as they landed in America. The first lady got into her SUV at Newark airport, while the president boarded Marine One to head to his Bedminster, New Jersey, golf course, with Trump giving his wife a hastily remembered peck on the cheek before he boarded the helicopter.

As son Barron Trump lives in New York City, there was speculation she may have been heading there to spend her birthday evening with him instead of with her husband.

While the first couple did hold hands throughout the pope’s funeral service, this open display of affection was the closest they had been in public for months.