Melania Trump

Melania Trump has served as first lady of the United States since 2025 as wife of the 47th president of the United States, Donald J. Trump. She previously served in this position from 2017-2021 during her husband's first term as 45th president. She is the second foreign-born first lady, after Louisa Adams, the British-born wife of President John Quincy Adams, who served from 1825-1829. She is also the second first lady to serve in this position nonconsecutively, after Frances Cleveland, the wife of President Grover Cleveland, who served from 1886-1889 and again from 1893-1897.

Trump, née Melania Knauss, was born in Novo Mesto, Slovenia, on April 26, 1970. She began a modeling career at the age of 16, and studied at the University of Ljubljana for one year. She married businessman Donald Trump on January 22, 2005, and became a U.S. citizen in 2006.

Trump spoke at the Republican National Convention in the summer of 2016, but played a relatively small role in both of his presidential campaigns. She launched BE BEST, an awareness campaign that strives to promote a world for children based on healthy living, kindness and respect, in 2018.

Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica (2020, Oct. 2). Melania Trump: American first lady. In Britannica. Retrieved on October 6, 2020, from https://www.britannica.com/biography/Melania-Trump.

The White House. (n.d.). Melania Trump. Retrieved on October 6, 2020, from https://www.whitehouse.gov/people/melania-trump.

White House Historical Association. (n.d.). Melania Trump. Retrieved on October 6, 2020, from https://www.whitehousehistory.org/bios/melania-trump.