Melania Trump Blasts ‘Malicious Gossip’ After Ex-Friend Claims She’s In Bitter Feud With Ivanka

Melania Trump spoke out on Thursday to slam “delusional & malicious gossip” after her former best friend spoke out to claim that the First Lady has a bitter rivalry with her stepdaughter, Ivanka Trump.

Melania Blasts ‘Malicious Gossip’

Melania took to Twitter on Thursday as she prepared to host an event at the White House on the drug addiction crisis, which is one of the cornerstones of the First Lady’s “Be Best” campaign.

“This afternoon I will be hosting a roundtable with some incredible citizens in recovery & the amazing organizations that support them,” Melania tweeted. “I encourage the media to focus & report on the nation’s drug crisis, not on delusional & malicious gossip.”

This afternoon I will be hosting a roundtable with some incredible citizens in recovery & the amazing organizations that support them. I encourage the media to focus & report on the nation's drug crisis, not on delusional & malicious gossip.

— Melania Trump (@FLOTUS) September 3, 2020

Melania’s Ex-Best Friend Pens Salacious Tell-All

This comes after Melania’s former best friend Stephanie Winston Wolkoff made a number of claims about the First Lady in her memoir “Melania & Me.” Wolkoff, who worked on Donald Trump’s inauguration and acted as an unpaid advisor in the East Wing in the early days of his presidency, alleged that Melania and Ivanka have a tense relationship.

Daily Mail reported that Wolkoff claimed in her book that Melania hatched a plan to block Ivanka out of photos showing President Trump taking the oath of office on Inauguration Day with her “Operation Block Ivanka.” She said that Melania approved seating arrangements for the inauguration that would keep Ivanka out of the camera shot when her dad was being sworn in as president.

“Ivanka texted me a photo of Barack Obama’s swearing-in, his hand on the Bible, Michelle, Malia, and Sasha standing to his left,” Wolkoff alleged. “She wrote, ‘FYI regarding the swearing in. It is nice to have family with him for this special moment.'”

Instead, Melania and Wolkoff teamed up to launch “Operation Block Ivanka,” according to the book.

“Yes, Operation Block Ivanka was petty. Melania was in on this mission. But in our minds, Ivanka shouldn’t have made herself the center of attention in her father’s inauguration,” Wolkoff wrote.

She claimed that Ivanka was trying to control the schedule of Inauguration Day and make it all about herself.

“It was Donald’s inauguration, not Ivanka’s,” Wolkoff alleged. “But no one was brave enough to tell her that. Melania was not thrilled about Ivanka’s steering the schedule and would not allow it. Neither was she happy to hear that Ivanka insisted on walking in the Pennsylvania Avenue parade with her children.”

Melania Denies Wolkoff’s Claims

Melania has long denied the claims made by Wolkoff, who has admitted to secretly taping her conversations with the First Lady.

“Anybody who secretly tapes their self-described best friend is by definition, dishonest,” Melania’s spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham said in a statement last week. “The book is not only full of mistruths and paranoia, it is based on some imagined need for revenge. Wolkoff builds herself up while belittling and blaming everyone she worked with, yet she still managed to be the victim. Sadly, this is a deeply insecure woman who’s need to be relevant defies logic.”

This piece was written by PoliZette Staff on September 3, 2020. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.