Don’t Fall for Melania’s Misdirection

I don’t really care, do you?

Melania Trump dropped a bombshell this week, claiming to be an ardent abortion rights supporter in a ‘leaked’ excerpt of her upcoming memoir and video posted to social media. “Why should anyone other than the woman herself have the power to determine what she does with her own body?,” she asks.

Americans are meant to believe that the timing of this reveal is mere coincidence. Never mind that her husband is trailing with women voters by more than 20 points, that stories of women killed by abortion bans have been dominating the national conversation, and that the presidential election is weeks away. She just felt called to share!

Do they think we’re stupid? Melania isn’t pro-choice, she’s pro-Melania. 

This announcement isn’t about a woman standing up to her powerful husband, or a heartfelt revelation about an issue close to the former first lady’s heart. Melania has always been complicit in her husband’s reign of terror and bigotry. And now, in a moment of unthinkable suffering, she is hawking a $40 book on the backs of dead women. ($250 if you want it signed with extra pictures.) 

It doesn’t hurt that coming out as a champion of reproductive rights might alleviate Donald Trump’s glaring woman problem. Mini Timmaraju, president of Reproductive Freedom for All, calls it “a desperate move from a desperate campaign.”

After all, Donald Trump has been working overtime to feign reasonableness on abortion—a response to voters’ fury and the absolute walloping Republicans have taken since Roe was overturned. Melania’s pro-choice pronouncement is simply the latest in a long line of Trump tactics. 

We’ve watched Trump promise to make IVF free, claim that he gave abortion rights “back to the people,” and, most recently, insist that he’d veto a national abortion ban. Anything to win back those women voters. The man who once took credit for the end of Roe now posts on Truth Social, “My Administration will be great for women and their reproductive rights.” 

But with a gender gap that’s closer to a chasm, Trump can’t stop there. He’s throwing everything—and everyone—at the wall. 

There’s a reason JD Vance showed up at the vice presidential debate with insidiously softened language on abortion, saying he’s prepared to earn back women’s trust. And why the Republicans drafting the new GOP platform reworked its abortion plank. Like Melania, they were dispatched to help distance Trump from what’s become a politically poisonous issue. 

More than anything, though, this is about distraction. Voters are reading story after story of women going septic, children forced to give birth, and, now, women dying. If Americans are going to be inundated with abortion news, Trump wants to make sure it’s news that he creates. 

What better way to change the conversation than for the former first lady to come out as pro-choice? And in a video that feels like a parody of a Calvin Klein ad, no less. 

By my last headline count, the strategy is working. 

Covering for the disgraced former president has always been a family affair, and this latest stunt with his wife proves no different. And while media outlets fall for Melania’s misdirection, I just have to hope that women voters—even Republicans—will see the truth: That there’s no sheen glossy enough to hide what abortion bans have done.