Melania Trump said on Friday in her first interview since the election that President-elect Donald Trump is receiving advice from their 18-year-old son, Barron Trump, crediting the younger Trump with helping his father win the 2024 presidential election.
Speaking to “Fox & Friends,” the incoming first lady said that “he was very vocal” in giving advice to his father on what media appearances to make in order to gain a more favorable shift among younger people.
“He is a grown young man. I’m very proud of him about his knowledge, even about politics and giving an advice to his father—he brought in so many young people. He knows his generation, because nowadays the young generation, they don’t sit in front of TV anymore,” Melania Trump said.
During the waning stages of the 2024 presidential race, Trump sat down with a number of popular podcasters such as Joe Rogan, who has millions of followers, as well as Theo Von, Lex Fridman, Adin Ross, and others. Vice President-elect JD Vance also appeared on a number of podcasts, including on Rogan’s show just days after Trump.
Earlier this year, the president-elect said he would trust his son’s political advice.
“He’s seen it. He doesn’t have to hear. He is a smart one. He doesn’t have to hear much. But ... he’s a great guy,” Trump said in an interview with Philadelphia’s Talk Radio 1210 WPHT, as he was on trial in New York City on falsification of business records charges.
Melania Trump also fielded questions from Fox News on how their son is dealing with college as the son of a former president and now incoming president. An 18-year-old freshman, Barron Trump currently attends New York University in Manhattan.
“I don’t think it’s possible for him to be a normal student,” Melania Trump said in the interview. “This is your road,” she added, describing advice she had given to her son. “This is your life.”
Also in the interview, the soon-to-be first lady said that preparing to enter the White House for the second time looks a lot different from the first go-around. Now, she and her husband know what to expect, she said.
“I know what you need to establish, you know what kind of people you need to hire to be in your office,” she said in the rare television appearance, where she promoted holiday ornaments she’s selling and her memoir as Christmas approaches.
She said her husband’s attitude after his 2024 win was not the same as when he won in 2016.
“The country and the people really supported him,” she said. “I think the energy is different. People around him are different.”
She also described working on her memoir, which was released several months ago, as a process that was “very personal and could be sometimes very joyful, but also traumatic and hard.” In the book, titled “Melania,” she described her feelings after learning and seeing that her husband was shot in the right ear during a Pennsylvania rally in July.
Her husband is due to be inaugurated for his second term as president in about a month and a half, on Jan. 20, 2025. The new Congress will certify the November presidential election results on Jan. 6, 2025.
