Melania Trump has addressed claims that her son Barron has autism for the first time in her new book.
The former First Lady quashed the rumors, which began after the election of her husband Donald Trump in 2016.
Barron was just ten years old when one of the former president’s biggest critics, comedian Rosie O’Donnell, sparked speculation that Barron might have the condition.
Melania said the bullying he was subjected to later made it impossible for him to accept O’Donnell’s eventual apology and accused her of acting with “pure malice.”
But she also revealed how it inspired her to focus her child-focused Be Best initiative on child welfare and online bullying.
Melania Trump has addressed claims that her son Barron has autism for the first time in her new memoir.
“Barron’s experience of being bullied both online and in real life after the incident is a clear indication of the irreparable damage caused,” said the New York Times reports he wrote in his memoirs. “No apology can undo the damage that has been inflicted.”
Melania took aim at O’Donnell, who has an autistic daughter, and claimed she had recirculated the rumors in an attempt to raise awareness about the condition.
“There is nothing shameful about autism (although O’Donnell’s tweet implied there was), but Barron is not autistic,” he writes, according to an excerpt from the daily beast.
He explained how O’Donnell had reposted a video speculating about how Barron’s behavior could indicate he has the condition.
“Someone painstakingly compiled the images and added captions like: ‘Their hands are moving erratically and not touching each other. “He was then seen making strange movements in his seat, typical of children with autism.”
He described the video as “devastating as a parent” and accused O’Donnell of “pure malice.”
“I was horrified by such cruelty,” Melania continues. ‘It was clear to me that she was not interested in raising awareness about autism. I felt like I was attacking my son because he didn’t like my husband.’
The former first lady denied the rumors that began after her husband Donald Trump’s electoral victory in 2016.
Melania recalled how her son was harassed online and said the damage he caused makes it impossible to accept an apology from comedian Rosie O’Donnell, who sparked the speculation.
Melania Trump addressed the situation in her new memoir, ‘Melania’
Trump and O’Donnell had been in a long-running feud that included the former president joking about making disparaging comments about the television producer when former Fox news host Megyn Kelly questioned him about his misogyny in the first Republican debate.
“You’ve called women fat pigs, dogs, bums, disgusting animals,” Kelly said, before Trump intervened and said, “Just Rosie O’Donnell.”
He also details his surprise at the “I encountered resistance from technology executives” at social media companies and other online giants when he met with their leaders at the White House in March 2018 to discuss child safety.
One of the memoir’s biggest revelations is Melania’s assertion of the right to abortion, which stands in stark contrast to her husband’s.
“A woman’s fundamental right to individual liberty and her own life gives her the authority to terminate her pregnancy if she so wishes,” he writes.
“Restricting a woman’s right to choose whether to terminate an unwanted pregnancy is the same as denying her control over her own body.”
However, on most other issues, she appears to hold similar views to her husband, including questioning the validity of the 2020 election result.
“You can’t keep counting votes for days, which is what they did,” he writes, seeming to explain his lack of condemnation for the January 6 assault on the Capitol.
She shared how the incident inspired her to focus her child-focused Be Best initiative on child welfare and online bullying.
Melania also addresses the 2018 storm surrounding her decision to wear a jacket emblazoned with the words, “I really don’t care, do you?” while visiting immigrant children in Texas
Melania Trump has been protective of Barron in the past
‘It was a disaster. Many Americans still have doubts about the election to this day. I’m not the only person questioning the results.’
Melania also addresses the 2018 storm surrounding her decision to wear a jacket emblazoned with the words, “I really don’t care, do you?” while visiting immigrant children in Texas.
The sartorial faux pas came at a time when her husband’s administration was overseeing a policy at the southern border that led to the separation of thousands of families.
The former first lady blames the policy on then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions and claims she personally pressured her husband to undo it.
“The government should not separate children from their parents,” he remembers telling her. “This has to stop.”
The decision to wear the jacket is presented as an attack on the media’s ‘biased narratives’ rather than being connected to the visit.
Her defense of her husband even extends to a description of their marriage, which glosses over several scandals during the campaign and time in office.
These include his infamous boast of being able to grab women by the genitals, which was recorded and published in 2016, as well as accusations that he paid hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels.
Instead, Melania paints a picture of a unified front, with the two sharing a love of Elton John and writing letters to King Charles of the United Kingdom.
The former First Lady also details that her husband gave her a front-row seat at some of the most significant moments in history, such as when she was invited to witness a military attack on ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.