President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump are working to make serious cuts to the Office of the First Lady, which would help Trump keep his promise to save taxpayers money.
Former First Lady Michelle Obama, with her “Let’s Move” campaign, lunch mandates, and expensive vacations around the world, required a staff of twenty employees. That’s quite a staff for an unelected position.
Melania Trump, on the other hand, has been spending a majority of her time in New York City while their son Barron is in school. In fact, she hadn’t been spotted Washington since she met the President in D.C. before traveling with the Prime Minister of Japan, Shinzo Abe, and his wife to Mar-a-Lago for the weekend.
Now, three insider sources say that the cuts are already happening:
So far, the first lady has only hired two people to be on her staff – Chief of Staff Lindsay Reynolds, an alumna of the George W. Bush administration and White House Social Secretary Anna Cristina Niceta Lloyd, an events planner who has worked on the last five inaugurals and for both Democratic and Republican secretaries of state.
Beyond that, the first lady’s East Wing staff generally includes communications aides – like a press secretary – schedulers, speech writers, policy people and those tasked with answering the influx of correspondence from the American people to the FLOTUS.
First Lady Trump’s office will have a limited team to handle White House tours, as they are about to re-open:
At least two dozen lawmakers signed a letter urging the Trump administration to open the White House back up for tours.
‘Presidents Clinton, Bush, and Obama all appointed a White House Visitors Office Director before being sworn in, and had reopened the White House to the public at this point,’ the letter noted.
In her February 1 statement, Reynolds promised to get the White House Visitors Office up and running as soon as possible.
‘I am working to ensure that the White House Visitors Office is fully staffed and operational and ready to accept tour requests for the public in the coming weeks after a traditional temporary closure during the transition period,’ she pledged two weeks ago.
This is a drastic change from the Obama White House, which seemed to have a limitless ability to spend taxpayer money to promote the causes of the First Lady. Any reduction in federal government staff is a good thing, and Melania Trump is assuming the traditional, classy role of the First Lady. Fantastic news!
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