Melania Trump is mourning her late mother, Amalija, who sadly passed away last week. The former First Lady was absent from the Trump family’s annual Christmas photo, and days later, after questions about her absence, Donald Trump revealed her mother was ill.
Not long afterward, Amalija passed away. Her funeral is set to be held later this week in Florida. However, Donald Trump will likely not be there. His trial date for E. Jean Carroll’s defamation trial is on the day of the funeral, and the former president asked the judge for the trial to be postponed. That didn’t happen – and Trump lashed out.
Melania Trump has been very private recently and has barely been seen at Mar-a-Lago. Her mother’s passing will likely not increase her public activities, and looking back, the two have had a very close relationship. Now, Donald Trump breaks silence on his wife – and she isn’t well at all.
For years and years, Melania Trump’s primary focus has been to help and support their son, Barron Trump, while juggling her job as First Lady and businesswoman. When looking back to her childhood, she has always had the same support of her parents, Viktor and Amalija, and this didn’t stop when she became the First Lady of the United States.
Amalija Knavs – the mother of Melania Trump
Viktor and Amalija Knavs have always been by her side, and many years ago, they, too, lived in the United States.
Amalija met Viktor in 1966 while he was the driver for a nearby town’s mayor. They fell in love and married. Although Slovenia was part of Communist Yugoslavia, and money was a big issue for many, Amalija and Viktor lived a very good life.
“I grew up with a beautiful family and had a wonderful childhood,” Melania Trump has said. “My mother and father taught us the importance of education, hard work and family.”
Viktor was a car mechanic and chauffeur, and her mother, Amalija, worked as a pattern-maker at a clothing factory. Amalija had a great passion for design and spent hours and hours making clothes for her daughters, Melania and Ines.
“[Amalija] was very pretty,” Vladimira Tomsic, Melania’s classmate and later in charge of a local hospital to which Melania donated $25,000 after marrying Donald Trump, told GQ in 2016. “She was always very fancy.”
When she became a mother, Amalija sewed clothing for herself and her two daughters, Ines and Melania, which would inspire the then-future First Lady. When she grew up, Melania did her own designs, and Amalija sewed them.
Viktor and Amalija brought Melania and Ines to France, Italy, and Germany on vacations. Meanwhile, in their hometown of Sevnica, Melania’s parents still own the same house, which they visit several times a year.
Moved to the US to support Melania
Melania Trump attended the university in Ljubljana before pursuing her dream job as a model. In 1996, she left for New York City. There, she lived in a shared apartment at Gramercy Park, but given that she was 26 years old – much older than the average aspiring model at the time – it was a gamble that she’d put everything on the line for.
Two years later – after her modeling career had taken off – she met Donald Trump, and her life changed forever.
As Donald Trump became the President of the United States – and Melania First Lady – Amalija and Viktor were seen several times at the White House, for example, during their daughter’s RNC speech in the White House Rose Garden.
In her speech, Melania thanked her parents for their sacrifice.
“My parents worked very hard to ensure our family could not only live and prosper in America but also contribute to a nation that allows for people to arrive with a dream and make it a reality,” she said. “I want to take the moment to thank my mother and father for all that they have done for our family. It is because of you that I am standing here today.”
Meanwhile, Viktor and Amalija now had the pleasure of being grandparents. According to Politico, Barron Trump has spent a significant amount of time with his grandma and grandpa and even speaks Slovenian.
According to Politico, they are “hyper-involved” in his life, and in 2017, the news outlet reported that Viktor and Amalija would “become more familiar figures around the White House.”
Amalija Knavs – mother of Melania Trump dead at 78
As reported by The New York Times, Melania’s parents “split their time among an apartment in Trump Tower, Mr. Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Florida and the suite in the White House once used by Mrs. Obama’s mother.”
While Viktor and Amalija have been very supportive, caring, and present in Melania’s and Barron’s lives, sad news has come to light.
Melania Trump was absent for the Christmas photo at Mar-a-Lago, which would have been only the second time she had been publicly seen in months. Questions about what had happened were asked, but no one understood what was happening. However, Donald Trump revealed the reason for his wife’s absence at his New Year’s Eve event at Mar-a-Lago was that her mother, Amalija, was “very ill.”
Sadly, on January 9, Trump shared the news that Amalija had passed away at the age of 78.
Melania Trump wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, “Amalija Knavs was a strong woman who always carried herself with grace, warmth, and dignity. She was entirely devoted to her husband, daughters, grandson, and son-in-law. We will miss her beyond measure and continue to honor and love her legacy.”
Amalija Knavs was significantly involved in Melania’s and Ines’s lives and spent much time with her grandson, Barron. However, little is known about her life and what she was like.
Now, Melania Trump’s former White House stylist, Hervé Pierre, has spoken out about Amalija and the few encounters with her he had.
Melania Trump’s former stylist reveals details of Amalija Knavs’ life
In an interview with WWD, Melania’s former stylist, Hervé Pierre, said she enjoyed fashion and cooking, describing the late mother of the former First Lady as “so lovely” and an “amazing cook.”
“She had a very similar taste in fashion to her daughter. She was certainly not into fluff,” Pierre said. “She loved fashion. She often came upstairs to have a peek at the clothes that I had brought before I met with Melania.”
While Amalija had inspired her daughter’s fashion interests, she never gave Pierre fashion advice or interfered in the decision process.
“My meetings with Melania were always just the two of us. We were very focused on the schedule and finding the right look for the occasion,” he said. “We were not looking at trends or flipping through fashion magazines. It was business oriented.”
One day, while Pierre was at the White House, Amalija asked him to go to the White House vegetable garden to get potatoes and carrots. He picked them out by “digging them from the dirt.”
“Later that night I was savoring a homemade soup made from the White House vegetable garden. It was quite chic, delicious and really fresh,” the stylist recalled.
Amalija Knavs’ funeral will be held on Thursday, January 18, in Florida, according to the Daily Mail. Precisely who will attend the funeral is not clear, but now it appears that Donald Trump, who wants to be there, might not be able to.
The former president – who took a landslide victory in the Iowa Republican presidential caucuses on Monday – is facing up to $10 million in defamation damages to columnist E. Jean Carroll after a jury last year found he sexually assaulted her.
Donald Trump denied delay of trial to attend Amalija Knavs’ funeral
As reported by the NY Post, Trump’s lawyer, Alina Habba, sent a letter to Manhattan federal Judge Lewis Kaplan, saying that he planned to attend the trial but would like to attend Amalija Knavs’s funeral first.
“Given that this is one of life’s sad unexpected realities, President Trump would greatly appreciate this minor accommodation during this difficult time,” Habba wrote to Kaplan. “I cannot imagine how this would prejudice Plaintiff.”
However, the federal judge has rejected Donald Trump’s plea to go to his mother-in-law’s funeral and delayed the trial. In a letter, Kaplan writes that the court “offers its condolences.”
“Mr. Trump is free to attend the trial, the funeral, or all or parts of both, as he wishes,” he wrote.
Further, the federal judge said Trump’s lawyers’ request was made late Friday afternoon, just before “the start of the [Martin Luther King Day] holiday weekend.”
E. Jean Carroll’s lawyer. Roberta Kaplan – who isn’t related to federal Judge Lewis Kaplan – accused Trump of using Amalija Knavs’ death as a stalling tactic.
“While we are very sorry for the Trumps’ loss, we cannot agree to a complete adjournment of trial at this time,” Kaplan wrote Habba on Friday, the NY Post reported.
“Ms. Carroll and our witnesses are prepared to proceed as scheduled Tuesday, and any delay would be severely prejudicial, particularly as your client is near certain to assert scheduling conflicts again and continues to defame Ms. Carroll on a near-daily basis in connection with his campaign for president.”
Donald Trump says Melania Trump is “devastated”
Before the Iowa caucuses, Donald Trump spoke in front of a crowd in Indianola, saying he wished to be by Melania’s side for her mother’s funeral. Meanwhile, he called Judge Lewis Kaplan an “animal.”
“My wife’s mother, who was incredible and a great beauty inside and out – incredible woman – she just died,” Trump said, as per the Daily Mail.
“And my wife was pretty devastated by that. I have a trial going on, a totally fake trial. And we asked the judge if I could take a day off for a funeral for my mother-in-law, who was very close to me also. And he said, ‘No.’ These are animals. Can you imagine that?”
The former president continued, “I’d like to support my wife, who is going to be standing at a funeral of her mother, who is a very special woman. Is she supposed to stand there alone? No, no, I’ll be there,’” he insisted.
Melania Trump has continued to stay very quiet and out of the spotlight. In the weeks before her mother died, members at Mar-a-Lago had rarely seen her, and many wondered where she was.
“She rarely exits Mar-a-Lago. It’s a strange, isolated life they have in that place,” Laurence Leamer, author of Mar-A-Lago: Inside the Gates of Power at Donald Trump’s Presidential Palace, told the Telegraph. “Nobody knows where she is. It’s like a mystery. It’s certainly talked about.”
Melania Trump ready to “leave her mark on history”
Meanwhile, a PageSix source states that it will change as Donald Trump aims to become President of the United States again.
Trump and his family are so secure that he will become president again that insiders at Mar-a-Lago say he’s reached an agreement with [wife] Melania [Trump] to step up top-tier diplomatic appearances in 2024.”
Another source told the news outlet, “Melania realizes it’s her time to join the ranks of historic first ladies and leave her mark on history… She feels better prepared for her potential role the second time around.”
