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When Melania Trump became the First Lady in 2017, she showed her impressive linguistic prowess. The Slovenian-born former model is reportedly the first First Lady in U.S. history to be fluent in five languages— Slovenian, English, French, Serbian, and German. While previous First Ladies have also been multilingual, Melania’s linguistic capabilities remained unmatched.
This reflects both her enthusiasm for learning and the opportunities her international upbringing and modeling career, afforded her. Born in Novo Mesto, Slovenia in 1970, Melania grew up speaking Slovenian. Slovenia’s strategic location in central Europe meant she was exposed to other languages from an early age.
After completing high school, she began studying at the University of Ljubljana to become an architect. Though she soon abandoned this path to pursue modeling full-time, her time at university likely helped strengthen her grasp of languages like German and Serbian, which were commonly spoken in regions near her homeland, as per The Express.
Melania’s blossoming modeling career in the 1990s took her across Europe, living and working in major fashion capitals like Paris and Milan. Immersed in these multilingual environments, her French vocabulary grew remarkably strong.
Her English too would have rapidly improved through her international travels and eventual move to New York City in 1996. In many ways, Melania’s multilingualism exemplifies the American immigrant story— born abroad yet able to achieve professional success through hard work, while also embracing aspects of her new culture. Yet she never abandoned her mother tongue over the years.
Melania’s language skills also highlight privileges that are not available to most immigrants. Her remarks in past interviews such as, “I’m not only a beauty, I’m smart. I have brains. I’m intelligent” reveal a sense of pride in both her looks and intellect— two assets that allowed the young Melanija Knavs to travel the world before becoming Mrs. Trump.
Melania’s arrival at the White House intrigued the American public as she maintained an aura of mystery. Author, Maureen Dowd, called her the ‘Slovenian Sphinx,’ a title that seems fitting, as reported by The Daily Beast. When Melania took office, her first goal was to safeguard her privacy and that of her son, Barron Trump. Over the years, she has diligently pursued this goal.
Barron and forty other delegates from Florida were selected to officially nominate Donald Trump as the Republican nominee earlier this year. The Daily Mail reported that an announcement issued by Melania’s office declined the offer citing ‘prior commitments.’
However, in the weeks leading up to Election Day on November 5, Barron made a few rare appearances alongside his dad. Like Mum, Barron is also known to speak Slovenian and has an accent. A TikToker who claimed to be Barron’s elementary school girlfriend, shared, “It’s very light, [you] can barely tell but the way he pronounces some words…[it] gives it away.” This aligns with Barron’s cameo on Larry King Live, years ago.
