Melania Trump stirs up a lot of feelings from the public, both positive and negative. The former model, who is now First Lady for a second term, is originally from Slovenia, and sadly, someone has decided that she’s not to be a statue. Pictures from near her hometown in Slovenia show that a statue of Melania has been cut off at the ankles and stolen.
Melania Trump’s journey to the White House is quite remarkable. Starting as a model in her home country of Slovenia, she took a leap of faith and put everything on one card, moving to New York City to try to become a famous model.
Things turned out great for the now-First Lady, not only because of her modeling career, but also because of the life she began living when meeting Donald Trump in the 90s. While she hasn’t lived in Slovenia for over 35 years, she has never forgotten where she comes from.
She taught her son, Barron Trump, the Slovenian language, and shortly after her husband took office for a second time, Melania showed that her language skills are still intact.
On X, one user posted a touching 30-second clip in which Melania comforted victims of the wildfires in Los Angeles earlier this year, including one in which she spoke with a woman in Slovenian. Social media users were quick to praise the First Lady for her caring demeanor and for speaking in her native language.
“Seeing Melania so much more involved this time around is amazing,” one user wrote, per the Daily Mail. Another added: “When we speak to people in their native tongue they feel heard, they feel listened to, they feel the love! What an incredible First Lady.”
Melania Trump’s Slovenian heritage
A third stated: “First Lady Melania Trump speaks her native language to comfort those devastated by the wildfires. Even in a ballcap Melania shows her beauty and grace.”
While Melania Trump isn’t visiting her home country regularly, especially since her parents moved to the US when Barron was born, her hometown of Sevnica has made sure to honor her and what she has done to put them on the map. Local chainsaw-wielding artist Alex “Maxi” Zupevc made a statue carving of Melania from a single piece of wood. There were divided opinions about whether it was right or wrong to put Melania as a statue. However, sadly, it burned down.
Who was responsible is unknown, but the US artist Brad Downey, who commissioned Alex Zupevc to create the original wooden sculpture, had a backup plan. He had already made a cast of the statue, and later, at the same site, a Melania statue reappeared in bronze.
Downey said at the unveiling that it had been designed to be “as solid as possible, out of a durable material which cannot be wantonly destroyed.” Moreover, he stated that the bronze statue that replaced the wooden one was motivated by the “frustrations with the policies of my birth country.”
“On the one hand we have people being held in cages on the US border with Mexico, on the other, in what is to me a clear contradiction, we have a first lady who is the first ever for whom English is not her mother tongue, whose US citizenship was fast-tracked on a visa reserved for immigrants with extraordinary ability. At the same time, her husband is xenophobic, anti-Islamic,” Downey told The Guardian. “I felt I could isolate this contradiction and make a portrait of it.”
Melania Trump statue in Slovenia has been stolen
The bronze statue would be a firmer and steadier piece. However, it has now disappeared and is being investigated by the police. The statue of Melania Trump can be seen chopped off at the ankles and has been carried away. Local law enforcement said they are treating “Melania’s” disappearance as “theft.”
Officers “conducted an inspection of the crime scene and collected information,” police spokesperson Alenka Drenik Rangus said in a statement on May 16. “The investigating judge and the district state prosecutor were informed about the theft.”
Artist Brad Downey stated that his Melania statue was political. He told the BBC that he suspects that the statue’s sudden disappearance “has something to do with Trump getting re-elected.”
As mentioned, the Melania statue has divided people. Meanwhile, local authorities in Sevnica condemned “any form of interference with private or public property” but added that “the image of the US First Lady was not something anyone was proud of.”
Franja Kranjc, who works at a bakery in Melania’s hometown that sells cakes with her face on them, has a clear opinion. According to him, the stolen statue won’t be missed at all.
“I think no one was really proud at this statue, not even the first lady of the USA,” Kranjc told the Associated Press. “So I think its OK that it’s removed.”
Melania Trump statue mocked on social media
When the news of the disappearance of the Melania Trump statue spread across the world, artist Brad Downey wrote on Instagram, “To remove the feet is to deny grounding, erase direction, and halt motion. What’s left is a fragment—rooted but silenced. A body no longer able to move forward, a ghost.”
Theft is never OK, but even so, people on social media quickly shared their thoughts on the statue’s disappearance. NBC shared the story on TikTok, and users wasted no time in the comment section.
“That’s the statue?? That could literally be of anyone. They put no effort into it,” one user wrote, while another jokingly said, “The artist truly captured her likeness. It’s uncanny.”
A third person wrote, “She’s missing here too…,” referencing the low-profile First Lady Melania Trump has been in recent months.
“She probably hired someone to rob it herself,” a fourth added.
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