Melania Trump’s absence from Washington raises questions about her role

When President Donald Trump traveled to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware this week to pay respects to a fallen member of the Navy SEALs, it was his daughter Ivanka — not his wife, Melania — who accompanied him. Melania Trump’s conspicuous absence at the solemn ceremony only underscored the fact that she vanished from public view days after her husband’s swearing-in two weeks ago. And it raised new questions about what role, if any, she plans to play as first lady.

Melania Trump shattered decades of tradition when she decided last year that she would not move into the White House when her husband took office, and would remain instead in the family’s lavish Manhattan penthouse so the couple’s 10-year-old son, Barron, could finish the school year. That decision has made for an unusually slow transition into what has traditionally been a hectic, demanding and heavily scrutinized role.

It was not until Wednesday that she named Lindsay Reynolds, who worked in the White House under President George W. Bush, as her chief of staff, a position that most first ladies fill before Inauguration Day. Melania Trump has still not filled other crucial positions, including social secretary and communications director.

Unanswered requests for White House tours, traditionally run by the first lady’s office, have been piling up by the thousands, according to people familiar with the process, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it. It is not clear how much planning has gone into the elaborate White House events that are among the heaviest tasks for first ladies, such as the annual Easter Egg Roll, which draws 35,000 attendees.

“She is far behind the curve compared to where modern first ladies have been by the time their husbands are inaugurated, in a quite unprecedented way,” said Myra Gutin, a professor at Rider University who specializes in first ladies. “We are in uncharted territory here.”

People close to Melania Trump say she has every intention of taking on a greater profile, though she is in no rush to establish a public presence. She is working behind the scenes to adjust to the job on her own terms, a task made infinitely more difficult by the implied comparison with Michelle Obama. Despite her own deep ambivalence about the role, Michelle Obama left it last month with a 68 percent approval rating and perhaps the most vaunted celebrity status ever enjoyed by a first lady.