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A former close acquaintance of Melania Trump has hit out at the former first lady after she celebrated a “personal milestone” of US citizenship.
Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, 53, was once a confidante and former adviser to the 54-year-old Trump. The pair were friends for two years before Trump became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 2004. But the ally turned adversary after Wolkoff’s departure from the White House in 2018 prompted much publicity, including the publication of her 2020 memoir. Melania and I– and revealed about his time with the first lady.
Since the pair have been at loggerheads, Wolkoff has launched a series of personal attacks criticizing Trump as inauthentic and his relationship with former president Donald Trump as “transactional” in a series of scathing social media posts.
On Sunday, the Slovenian-American model took to X to show her gratitude for being a US citizen for nearly two decades.
“Becoming an American citizen is an achievement that inspires our continued commitment to this great country,” Trump wrote in the X. “Today marks the 18th anniversary of this personal milestone.”
Six years into the saga, Wolkoff was quick to attack the former first lady when she shared it NBC News article about the Republican presidential candidate promising to end birthright citizenship if he takes the White House in November.
Ultimately the constitutional right means that the parents must have legal status in the US for the child to be considered a citizen. The law now states that it requires at least one blood or adoptive parent to be a US citizen by birth or naturalized at the time of the child’s birth.
Wolkoff claimed that Melania, who became a citizen after her son Barron, 18, benefited from the policy.
“Melania’s Personal Milestone is just that, just for MELANIA TRUMP! Melania became a US citizen on 7/28/2006 AFTER Barron was born on 3/20/2006,” he wrote.
“But…for others, Trump said he would end long-standing Constitutional Rights and that he would sign an executive order that would ‘Ensure that children born to parents who do not have legal status in the US will not be considered US Citizens.’ ”
Six years into an on-and-off relationship with the owner of the Trump Organization in 2004, the former woman was first introduced to the former. Vogue special event Planner Wolkoff in a bid to transition her to New York life. After more than a decade of friendship, Wolkoff joined the first lady’s office as an unpaid adviser in 2016, after Donald Trump defeated Democratic rival Hillary Clinton in the primaries and took office.
Just two years later, the Wolkoff-Trump relationship broke down after a scandal involving the presidential inauguration committee, which allegedly paid $26 million to Wolkoff’s WIS Media Partners company, The New York Times reported.
He denied the claim and said his company had $1.62 million.
“Am I fired? Not. Do I personally receive $26 million or $1.6 million? Not. Did I get thrown under the bus? Yes,” he told the newspaper in 2019.
After the release of Wolkoff’s bombshell book, which he declared himself “to everyone”, the Department of Justice filed a lawsuit in October 2020 saying that the former aide violated the White House nondisclosure agreement by publishing the memoir.
It was voluntarily dismissed without reason in February 2021.
Wolkoff has since frequently attacked the Trumps while attracting media attention. She continues to spin the narrative that the Trumps’ relationship was created by the television executive behind her husband’s hit show, The Apprentice.
“Millions of Americans watch The Apprentice. Donald is a household name. They need women who look and play the part and let them become stars,” he said at X last month.
He said in a Animals every day op-ed in May that the former first lady is “cruel survivor and opportunist – willing to do anything for the resort for the purpose of self-preservation”.
Wolkoff also claimed last year that the Trumps had a temporary split after the first lady found out about her husband’s alleged relationship with porn star Stormy Daniels – which was at the center of the new criminal hush money trial and saw him found guilty of 34 counts of crime.
Now, Melania is set to release her own memoir, publisher Skyhorse Publishing announced last week. The name itself Melania called it a “powerful and inspiring story of a woman who has carved her own path, overcome adversity and defined personal excellence.”
