Introducing the new US First Family, for the second time
Donald Trump will be getting the keys to the White House again in January, and he and Melania won’t have to waste time finding their way to the rose garden.
It will all seem very familiar, even though Joe and Jill Biden did some tinkering with the decor in the four years they spent away.
The Trumps won yesterday’s election much more easily than many predicted, so we’ll be seeing much more of Donald Trump and his family, with includes three wives, five children, and 10 grandchildren (soon to be 11).
It is large enough to need a family tree diagram to get your head around, much like if you try to restart reading Game of Thrones.
So here it is:
At the top, we have Donald Trump, the 45th and soon to be 47th president of the United States.
To very briefly recap his family life (more on this later), he has been married three times, first to the late Ivana Trump, who he had three children with but divorced in 1990.
Their marriage broke down after Ivana, and the rest of the country, learned her husband had been having an affair with Marla Maples, a model he went to welcome a daughter, Tiffany, with in 1993.
Trump and Maples got married shortly afterwards, but the relationship did not last and they also went on to separate in 1997.
During a drawn-out divorce, Trump met his current wife Melania, and they dated for some years before getting married in 2005 and having their son Barron.
Donald and Melania Trump
Former fashion model Melania Trump has not played a major role in her husband’s re-election campaign, preferring to stay behind the scenes although she is popular with his base.
While some are convinced that she ‘hated Washington’ during the couple’s last presidential term, with ‘Free Melania’ even trending as a meme after his first inauguration, their relationship has endured for some 25 years.
In an emotive statement after her husband was shot in an assassination attempt on July 14, Melania wrote: ‘When I watched that violent bullet strike my husband, Donald, I realized my life, and Barron’s life, were on the brink of devastating change.
‘A monster who recognized my husband as an inhuman political machine attempted to ring out Donald’s passion — his laughter, ingenuity, love of music, and inspiration.
‘Donald, the generous and caring man who I have been with through the best of times and the worst of times.’
In a memoir released earlier this month, she also wrote a passionate defence of abortion rights, a surprise to many given that Trump’s administration overturned Roe vs Wade which saw abortion bans implemented in many states.
However, Donald did indicate that he had not read it, telling a rally: ‘Go out and get her book! She just wrote a book… I hope she said good things about me… I don’t know, I didn’t… so busy… Go out and buy it, it’s great. And if she says bad things about me I’ll call you all up and I’ll say don’t buy it, get rid of it!’
She has been the focus of conspiracy theories, with some convinced only this week that she had been replaced with a body double due to not taking off her sunglasses indoors.
Perhaps the biggest controversy for her personally was when she wore a coat emblazed with the words ‘I really don’t care, do u?’ to meet young migrants after a controversy about children separated from parents at the border.
The couple have one son together, Barron Trump, who is 18 and towers above both of them at 6ft 7.
In January, Trump addressed his son’s height after a record-breaking win in the Iowa caucuses, while thanking his mother-in-law Amalija Knavs, who died that month, for all she had done for them.
‘Boy, did she take care of Barron,’ Trump said from his campaign headquarters in Des Moines. ‘That’s how he got so tall – he only ate her food,’ he joked.
In September, Barron enrolled as a freshman at New York University’s Stern School of Business, so he will not be living at the White House full time.
‘He’s a very high aptitude child, but he’s no longer a child,’ Trump said. ‘He’s just passed into something beyond child-dom. He’s doing great.’
Donald and Ivana Trump
Born Ivana Marie Zelníčková, Ivana Trump grew up in the former Czechoslovakia and moved to Canada in the 1970s, before settling in the US and becoming a socialite, ski racer and model.
She married Donald in 1977 and the couple had three children together: Donald Trump Jr, Ivanka Trump and Eric Trump.
After their marriage, she held several positions within the Trump business organisation, but became well known in her own right for her accent and her signature beehive hairdo.
Ivana’s marriage to Donald became troubled when his affair with actress Marla Maples became public and she divorced him in 1992, then starting up her own clothing, jewellery and beauty product lines.
She appeared in the 1996 hit film The First Wives Club and also made a guest appearance on the seventh series of UK Celebrity Big Brother in 2010.
Ivana died in 2022 aged 73 after suffering blunt force injuries to her torso from falling down the stairs at home.
News of Ivana’s death was first shared by her ex-husband, Donald Trump, who wrote on his social media platform Truth Social: ‘I am very saddened to inform all of those that loved her, of which there are many, that Ivana Trump has passed away at her home in New York City.
‘She was a wonderful, beautiful, and amazing woman, who led a great and inspirational life.’
In a separate statement, the Trump family described Ivana as ‘a force in business, a world-class athlete, a radiant beauty, and caring mother and friend’, with Eric Trump adding how she Eric Trump ‘fled from communism and embraced this country. She taught her children about grit and toughness, compassion and determination.’
She wrote several books including Raising Trump, which was published in 2017, and said in an ABC interview the same year that she had forgiven Donald.
‘He was a loving father, don’t get me wrong, and he was a good provider, but he was not the father which would take a stroll and go to the Central Park or go play to baseball with them or something,’ Ivana said at the time.
When their children ‘were about 18-years-old’, she said, ‘he could communicate with them, because he could start to talk business with them’.
Ivana was married four times, most recently to Italian actor Rossano Rubicond.
Donald Trump and Marla Maples
Marla Maples is an actress, television personality, film producer and model from Cohutta, Georgia.
Maples met Trump in 1989, and their extramarital affair soon became the subject of tabloid speculation.
After having daughter Tiffany Trump together, they went on to get married in 1993 in a big ceremony at Trump’s plaza hotel, after he crafted an iron-clad prenup.
They separated in 1997 and finally divorced two years later, during which time Trump met his third wife.
In an appearance on Oprah, Where Are They Now?, Maples recollected that she felt like she parented Tiffany alone: ‘I’ve had a real blessing of being able to raise Tiffany as a single parent.
‘Her daddy, of course took care of school, her education and some of our needs, but as far as the day to day parenting, I’ve been the one here.’
Tiffany is now expecting her own baby with Michael Boulos, the son of Lebanese billionaire Massad Boulos, who moved to Texas as a teenager and tried to help Trump win over Arab Americans during the election.
Speaking in Michigan on the campaign trail earlier this month, Donald Trump said both she and his son-in-law were ‘very exceptional’ and revealed: ‘She’s gonna have a baby. So that’s nice.’
Who are Donald Trump’s other children?
His oldest child is Donald Trump Jr, who is 46 and has spent his professional life with his father.
He joined the family business fulltime in 2001, and went on to help with Trump’s presidential election campaign in 2016, becoming an outspoken supporter.
Previously married to Vanessa Trump, the mother of his five children, he is currently dating Kimberly Ann Guilfoyle, an attorney and television news personality who became a top fundraiser for the Trump campaign.
Donald Trump Jr was suspended from Twitter in 2020 for falsely claiming that there is a cure for coronavirus, but was reinstated along with his father when Elon Musk took over and now has over 12 million followers.
‘Show me the memes!’ he urged them after his father’s victory became clear.
He testified in Trump’s civil fraud trial in July, along with younger brother Eric, when Trump Sr was found liable of inflating his net worth to get better loan and insurance terms, for which he was ordered to pay $454 million.
American businesswoman Ivanka Trump, 43, is Trump’s eldest daughter.
She was formally a model, but took on a political role as Senior Advisor to her father in 2017 during his last presidential term.
Married with three children with Jared Kushner, she was seen as a moderating force on her father who said she had been ‘driving me crazy’ on increasing child tax credit.
After Trump left the White House, Ivanka said she would be focusing on her children and family and she has stayed out of politics during her father’s 2024 campaign.
Eric Trump, 40 works alongside Donald Trump Jr as trustee and executive vice president of the Trump Organisation.
Less outspoken than his older siblings on political matters, he was nevertheless one of the central advisors, fundraisers, and campaign surrogates during the 2016 presidential campaign.
In September, Eric said he was part of the LGBT community, although it was later revealed that he mispoke.
Who are Donald Trump’s grandchildren?
In total, Mr Trump has 10 grandchildren from his five children, with Tiffany set to welcome the 11th.
Donald Trump Jr and his former wife Vanessa Trump have five children: Kai Madison Trump, 17, Donald John III Trump, 15, Tristan Milos Trump, 13, Spencer Frederick Trump, 12, and Chloe Sophia Trump, 10.
Kai, the eldest of his grandchildren, spoke at the Republican National Convention this year ‘to share the side of my grandpa that people don’t often see’: ‘To me, he’s just a normal grandpa. He gives us candy and soda when our parents aren’t looking. He always wants to know how we’re doing in school.’
Addressing a recent assassination attempt on Trump, she added: ‘A lot of people have put my grandpa through hell and he’s still standing.
‘Grandpa, you are such an inspiration and I love you.’
Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner have three children: Arabella Rose Kushner, 13, Joseph Frederick Kushner, 11, and Theodore James Kushner, eight. Ms Trump often shares updates of her children on her Instagram to her seven and a half million followers.
Eric Trump and his wife Lara Trump have two children together: Eric ‘Luke’ Trump, who is seven and Carolina Dorothy Trump, the youngest Trump family member (for now) aged five.
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