First lady Melania Trump has plans for what she hopes to accomplish during President Donald Trump’s second administration — but she won’t let the White House rule her life, according to an insider.
“She doesn’t believe she has obligations in the political world,” a longtime social source in New York and Palm Beach tells PEOPLE. “But she does care about children and their well being.”
“Anything she may do in this administration will happen if she has the time and interest to pursue it,” the source continues.
The insider says Melania’s approach to the Trump world lands somewhere in the middle of how Donald’s first wife, Ivana Trump, and his second wife, Marla Maples, navigated the unique spotlight.
“Melania is smart like Ivana,” the source says, “but while Ivana collaborated with Donald on work projects, Melania is more traditional in the Marla way and remains more under the radar when possible.”
That comes with an added challenge for the first lady, 54, as the only of Donald’s wives who was brought into the political fold as a result of her marriage.
“Politics is not her world,” the source says, noting that Melania’s style is to operate “in her own small circle of family members and one or two close friends.”
The source claims that while Donald is concerned with how he looks on the political stage, Melania “couldn’t care less how she looks politically.”
Melania’s hesitance with politics has made her one of the more mysterious political spouses in modern times, and the insider believes that she will be better remembered for what she didn’t do as first lady, rather than what she did.
“You can learn more about Melania by what she doesn’t do or say” over the next four years, the source tells PEOPLE.
“Just because she is quiet in a crowd doesn’t mean she is aloof, not listening, or necessarily disinterested,” the insider adds. “Her mind is filled with what she does every day, her own life, and what interests her.”
“Donald does his thing, and she does hers,” the source explains. “She tells it like it is when they talk and he listens. Does he do what she says? Not necessarily, but it has happened.”
Insight into Melania’s level of participation in Donald’s second presidency follows her revelation on a January episode of Fox & Friends — one week before the inauguration — that she plans to be based in the White House over the next four years, but will split her time between Washington, D.C., New York City and Palm Beach, Fla.
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During that same interview, Melania said that during Trump’s first administration, she “didn’t have much support” from the public, suggesting that “maybe some people, they see me as just the wife of the president.”
“But I’m standing on my own two feet, independent,” she said in the interview. “I have my own thoughts, I have my own yes and no. I don’t always agree what my husband is saying or doing, and that’s okay.”
She added that she will tell the president when she disagrees with him, and “sometimes he listens, sometimes he doesn’t,” she said. “And that’s okay.”
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