Melania Promotes Her Terrible Movie in Weirdest White House Event

Either Melania Trump doesn’t know the law, or she doesn’t care to follow it.

The first lady denied that she was using the White House in order to promote her unwatchable documentary, Melania, during a press conference on Wednesday—mere minutes after plugging the film.

“Why do you feel it’s appropriate to use an official White House event to promote your documentary?” asked CNN’s Betsy Klein.

“This is not promotion,” Mrs. Trump said. “We are here celebrating the release of the hostages of Aviva [Siegel] and Keith [Siegel].

“That’s why we are here, it’s nothing to do with promotion,” she added.

But just moments prior, Melania did exactly that, referring to a scene from her film in relation to the recently freed American Israeli hostages.

“It was an emotional meeting, and it is captured on camera and available to see in my new film, Melania,” she said of her first meeting with Aviva Siegel.

It is strictly illegal for federal officials to use their public office for their own private gain, according to the Office of Government Ethics. It is also illegal for a federal official or employee to leverage their position in order to assist their friends, relatives, or nongovernmental affiliates, such as businesses or, perhaps, film studios.

So far, Melania has failed to impress audiences or critics, though it has defied expectations at the box office. The film, which was produced by Amazon’s film studios, cost a whopping $75 million. By Tuesday, it had raked in $7 million, reported MS NOW.

In the United States, reports have circulated that the film has not organically filled seats but rather relied on “fake ticket sales” or bulk seat purchases that were distributed to senior citizen centers or Republican activists for screenings over the weekend. In the U.K., the documentary’s premiere sold just one ticket.

But the eyes that did catch the flick were overwhelmingly unimpressed. On Monday, The Guardian corrected its scathing review of the film, apologizing to its readers for giving the film a single star. “A formatting issue led an earlier version to be awarded one star, when the reviewer’s intention was zero,” the correction reads.

It’s not the first time that the Trump family has used the prestige of the Oval Office to push product, however. Last year, Donald hosted a Tesla commercial on the White House lawn during an international boycott of the Elon Musk–led company.

And in the midst of the pandemic, the president and his daughter Ivanka used their federal platform to shill beans for Goya amid nationwide calls to boycott the company after its CEO said the country was “blessed” to have Trump as its leader. The stunt came during a push by the Trumps to increase the president’s appeal with Latino voters ahead of the 2020 election.

The Trump administration is probing claims of anti-white racism at Nike.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is investigating the sportswear company over “systemic allegations of D.E.I.-related intentional race discrimination” against white employees and job applicants. The commission filed a motion in federal court in Missouri Wednesday to force the company to comply with a September subpoena.

The EEOC’s chair, Andrea Lucas, who first joined the agency as a commissioner after being nominated by Trump in 2020, filed a discrimination charge against Nike in 2024 under President Biden, when the commission still had a Democratic majority. Last year, Trump fired the agency’s chair, Charlotte Burrows, and appointed Lucas to the position. In its court filing Wednesday, the EEOC argues that Nike has fought the agency’s subpoena and has provided only partial responses to the government’s requests for information.

“The E.E.O.C. seeks information directly relevant to the allegations that Nike subjected white employees, applicants and training program participants to disparate treatment based on race in various employment decisions, including layoffs, internship programs and mentoring, leadership development and other career development programs,” the court filing states.

Lucas has made targeting DEI her priority since becoming chair of the EEOC, the agency responsible for handling discrimination complaints of all kinds. Under Trump, that means claims of discrimination from marginalized groups take a back seat to the far right’s belief in anti-white discrimination, which Trump too believes is rampant. The Trump administration is trying to make an example out of Nike, a high-profile multinational corporation, to push its racist ideology.

A Republican senator wants Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and ICE to stay out of his state.

Mississippi Senator Roger Wicker has come out against a proposed ICE detention facility in Byhalia, noting that the facility’s construction in the small town would not give the community anything in return.

“While I support the enforcement of immigration law, I write to express my opposition to this acquisition and the proposed detention center,” he wrote in his letter to Noem Wednesday. “This site is currently positioned for economic development purposes.... Converting this industrial asset into an ICE detention center forecloses economic growth opportunities and replaces them with a use that does not generate comparable economic returns or community benefits.”

Wicker also noted “serious feasibility concerns” like water and energy costs and medical care. “Existing medical and human services infrastructure in Byhalia is insufficient to support such a large detainee population. Establishing a detention center at this site would place significant strain on local resources,” he continued.

Wicker’s rejection reaffirms reports of discontent among red states that are being forced to become proving grounds for immigration raids on the whims of the Trump administration. It also comes as multiple Democratic states and cities, including Maryland and California, have moved to place greater restrictions on the actions of federal immigration agents.

Democratic Representative Maxine Waters caught Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent in a clear and obvious lie during a congressional hearing.

“Did you write a letter to investors raising concerns about the impact of tariffs, writing that ‘tariffs are inflationary’? Did you say that at that time, yes or no?” Waters asked.

“Uh, no,” Bessent replied.

“OK … we have a New York Times article that agrees that you said that,” Waters said.

“Great, New York Times,” Bessent said, smiling.

Waters continued:

“Last summer, when you testified before a Senate committee, you said, and I quote, ‘There is no inflation. Tariffs are not being passed on to consumers.’ You were quite definitive, and even claimed that critics had ‘tariff derangement syndrome,’” she said. “Well, those comments are at odds with the statement you made to investors that tariffs are inflationary.... Are tariffs inflationary? Yes or no?”

“According to the San Francisco Federal Reserve … tariffs do not cause inflation,” Bessent said.

Bessent may have very well perjured himself, given the letter he claimed doesn’t exist certainly does. In that January 2024 letter, which Semafor’s Eleanor Mueller first highlighted, Bessent wrote: “Tariffs are inflationary and would strengthen the dollar--hardly a good starting point for a US industrial renaissance.” He then goes on to argue that Trump will weaken the dollar to “make US manufacturing competitive.”

Bessent attacked The New York Times to distract from Waters’s question, as if nothing reported about him in the paper could possibly be true. When asked to clarify, Bessent stated that if he even said that tariffs were inflationary, he was wrong.

This is all part of an effort to shield the average American from the harsh reality that they, not other countries, are shouldering most of the economic burdens of Trump’s tariff wars.

“Not only did he lie, but his advice was horrible on every level,” Representative Sean Casten commented. “Under Trump and Bessent they have imposed tariffs, overseen a collapse in the US dollar and delivered a collapse in US manufacturing jobs.”

The chief strategist during the president’s first term has a grim vision for the 2026 midterm elections, and it involves armed federal agents.

“You’re damn right we’re gonna have ICE surround the polls come November,” Steve Bannon said on his War Room podcast on Tuesday.

“We’re not gonna sit here and allow you to steal the country again,” Bannon continued, repeating Donald Trump’s thoroughly debunked 2020 election conspiracy. “And you can whine and cry and throw your toys out of the pram all you want, but we will never again allow an election to be stolen.”

Caroline Wren, a GOP fundraiser that was on the podcast, agreed with Bannon, claiming that dissent against ICE activity and its funding was fueled by individuals who “don’t want ICE at the polling stations to stop illegals from voting.”

It is, and has been, illegal and impossible for noncitizens to vote in U.S. elections.

Bannon’s comments seem to be the latest escalation in a nationwide Republican push to tighten up voter restrictions to a dystopian degree. Last year, conservative lawmakers passed the SAVE Act, requiring people to confirm their names with documented proof of citizenship before they register to vote—a detail that legal experts have warned could prevent droves of married women from casting their ballot.

Trump seemed to be on the same wavelength as Bannon the day prior, telling former FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino during an interview Monday that Republicans should “take over and nationalize” elections in several states.

“The Republicans should say, ‘We want to take over,’” Trump said. “We should take over the voting, the voting in at least many—15 places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting.”

Since he lost the 2020 election, Trump and his allies have obsessed over contrived claims of voter fraud—a statistical nonissue in U.S. elections. For instance, a statewide audit out of Georgia, the epicenter of Trump’s baseless theory, revealed in 2024 that just 20 noncitizens out of 8.2 million residents existed on the state’s voter roll, approximately 0.00024 percent of the state’s voting population. Out of those 20, only nine participated in elections years ago, before ID was required as a part of the voter verification process. The other 11 individuals were registered but never actually voted, according to the secretary of state of Georgia, Brad Raffensperger.