--- title: First Lady Melania Trump Reflects Views of Women in 2016 description: The wife of Donald Trump and the history of First Ladies reveals how society views women in each time period canonical: https://time.com/4608959/melania-trump-first-lady-politics/ author: Ruby Shamir article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-12-28T12:00:11.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:49:13.803Z article:section: Ideas og:title: Melania Trump Will Reveal How America Views Women og:description: The role of FLOTUS reflects the time we live in og:url: https://time.com/4608959/melania-trump-first-lady-politics/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltd468ff2fffe36c89/6988b3a886f68ef6186e3027/melania-trump-first-lady-white-house-donald-hillary-clinton.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3676 og:image:height: 2068 og:image:alt: Republican Presidential Nominee Donald Trump Holds Election Night Event In New York City og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Melania Trump Will Reveal How America Views Women twitter:description: The role of FLOTUS reflects the time we live in twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltd468ff2fffe36c89/6988b3a886f68ef6186e3027/melania-trump-first-lady-white-house-donald-hillary-clinton.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Melania Trump Will Reveal How America Views Women > Sponsored content. 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Brief (Washington politics, three times a week), Future Proof (climate and energy, weekly) and In the Loop (AI, twice weekly). All are free at time.com/newsletters and together reach more than 1.1 million engaged readers. #### Which TIME newsletter should I subscribe to? It depends on what you follow. For a daily briefing, The Brief. For health, Health Matters. For Washington politics, D.C. Brief. For AI and technology, In the Loop. For climate and energy as a business story, Future Proof. For culture recommendations, Worth Your Time. For how TIME's journalism gets made, Inside TIME. Readers can select any combination at time.com/newsletters. #### Are TIME's newsletters free? Yes. All seven TIME newsletters are free to join at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes TIME's newsletters? TIME journalists write them. Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. ## Video: Melania Trump Says She’ll Fight Cyber-Bullying as First Lady [Watch (HLS stream): Melania Trump Says She’ll Fight Cyber-Bullying as First Lady](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/iW2WKRtc.m3u8) (0:40)  _Published 2016-11-03. In a rare campaign speech, Melania Trump said that one of her key issues as First Lady would be to combat cyber-bullying_ by [Ruby Shamir](https://time.com/author/ruby-shamir/) ## Ruby Shamir Dec 28, 2016 12:00 PM UTC  Melania Trump acknowledges people in the crowd after her husband and Republican president-elect Donald Trump delivered his acceptance speech at the New York Hilton Midtown in the early morning hours of November 9, 2016 in New York City. Melania Trump acknowledges people in the crowd after her husband and Republican president-elect Donald Trump delivered his acceptance speech at the New York Hilton Midtown in the early morning hours of November 9, 2016 in New York City. Mark Wilson—Getty Images by [Ruby Shamir](https://time.com/author/ruby-shamir/) ## Ruby Shamir Dec 28, 2016 12:00 PM UTC Her husband won a contentious, bruising election for the presidency, despite [losing the popular vote](http://www.history.com/topics/us-presidents/presidential-election-facts). He was said to be dismissive of women. She was [born in Europe](http://www.firstladies.org/biographies/firstladies.aspx?biography=6) and made a home in the United States only in her mid-20s. But, married to an ambitious scion, she was accustomed to hobnobbing with the rich and powerful. Of course I’m talking about Louisa Adams, wife of our sixth president John Quincy Adams, who called the White House a “[dull and stately prison](http://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/99-03-02-4304).” Donald Trump’s key appointments are beginning to reveal the outlines of his incoming administration and its priorities. But what about a position that is essentially already filled—that of [first lady](http://time.com/4551325/eleanor-roosevelt-hillary-clinton-first-ladies/)? It’s an undefined role that is shaped as much by the woman who occupies it as by Americans’ expectations of women and of wives at a given moment in time. What a first lady does and how those actions are received also tells us a little bit about ourselves, especially as we look back through a historical lens. As champions, advocates, ambassadors and, yes, wives, sometimes first ladies overstep traditional bounds and are deemed controversial. Other times, they hit just the right balance, generating goodwill for their husbands’ administrations while making a substantive contribution. Where a first lady falls on this spectrum depends in part on the balance she strikes between her pursuits and the public’s appetite for her engagement. A first lady is an unelected advisor who knows the president’s strengths and vulnerabilities on a personal level better than anyone else could. As his chosen life partner, she is his most trusted ally. And yet, that intimate access also generates suspicion that first ladies may overstep some invisible boundary in the eyes of jealous staffers or a public unwilling to see the position of “wife” as qualifying her to have informed opinions. Regardless of political party or issue of focus, all first ladies need to adapt to the unusual, unspoken, sometimes contradictory expectations of the position while under the unforgiving glare of the brightest spotlight. Donald Trump defeated a former first lady, Hillary Clinton, for the Oval Office. As is well documented, Clinton was both beloved and reviled as a lightning rod while she advocated for many of the Clinton administration’s top initiatives as a groundbreaking first lady. After the White House, she went on to do many things no other first lady had ever done, including being the first woman ever to come close to winning the White House, garnering [almost 66 million votes](http://time.com/4608555/hillary-clinton-popular-vote-final/), the choice of an overwhelming plurality of American voters in 2016. Pioneering as she was, First Lady Hillary Clinton stood on the shoulders of all the women who occupied that position before her and at different points she evoked their memories. Abigail Adams’s prescient early call for women’s rights; Eleanor Roosevelt’s unwavering social activism; and Jackie Kennedy’s commitment to preserving the history of the presidency all influenced Clinton’s service. And then there were the first ladies who couldn’t avoid the sting of the public’s rebuke, no matter what their intentions were. Mary Todd Lincoln’s fiery independence and abolitionist agenda, along with her designs for refurbishing a decaying White House during the Civil War, evinced harsh criticism. Nellie Taft played so prominent a role early in her husband’s presidency that he once addressed a note to her “to the real President from the nominal President” and her confrontations with personnel terrified senior staff. Nancy Reagan was vilified for her presumed manipulations of the president and for [her lavish tastes](http://www.nytimes.com/1982/02/17/us/nancy-reagan-gives-up-dress-designer-loans.html). There may be a hint of chauvinism in these broadsides, and a whiff of discomfort regarding perceived nepotism that ignites such a strong backlash against first ladies who appear to overreach. But another factor may also be the public’s reaction against first ladies who don’t respect the symbolic weight of their unusual position, pushback by a populace that wants to see a first family operate above the fray of political horse-trading. Michelle Obama will leave office enormously popular. This may be because she stuck to a few non-partisan, core issues during her time as first lady, despite being an experienced, Harvard-educated attorney who is no stranger to political combat. Life in the White House is anything but predictable. We don’t know yet how Melania Trump will shape her husband’s presidency or what her story will tell us about the complexity and contradictions of our attitudes towards women in our time. But as we enter a new and uncertain era for the presidency, it’s comforting to know that the family entering the White House and assuming these extraordinary roles will inevitably learn from, and lean on, the lessons of their predecessors and the institutional memory of our grand People’s House. Perhaps [Melania Trump’s decision to stay in New York](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/reliable-source/wp/2016/11/20/melania-trump-and-son-barron-will-reportedly-stay-in-new-york-after-the-presidential-inauguration/?utm%5Fterm=.d716a8a0432e) for her son’s schooling was prompted by [Jackie Kennedy’s advice](https://www.jfklibrary.org/JFK/JFK-in-History/Jacqueline-Kennedy-in-the-White-House.aspx) not to “bungle raising your children.” Or maybe, for now, she’s keeping her distance from the White House because she was moved by something else [Jackie Kennedy](http://time.com/3878253/jackie-kennedy-in-the-sixties-classic-photos-of-an-american-icon/) said: “The one thing I do not want to be called is ‘first lady’… It sounds like a saddle horse.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4608959/melania-trump-first-lady-politics/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4608959/melania-trump-first-lady-politics/"},"headline":"Melania Trump Will Reveal How America Views Women","datePublished":"2016-12-28T12:00:11.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T07:49:13.803Z","description":"Each FLOTUS reflects the times","url":"https://time.com/4608959/melania-trump-first-lady-politics/","keywords":["politics"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltd468ff2fffe36c89/6988b3a886f68ef6186e3027/melania-trump-first-lady-white-house-donald-hillary-clinton.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Ruby Shamir","jobTitle":"","url":"https://time.com/author/ruby-shamir/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltd468ff2fffe36c89/6988b3a886f68ef6186e3027/melania-trump-first-lady-white-house-donald-hillary-clinton.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Republican Presidential Nominee Donald Trump Holds Election Night Event In New York City","caption":"Republican Presidential Nominee Donald Trump Holds Election Night Event In New York City","creditText":"Mark Wilson—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4608959/melania-trump-first-lady-politics/","name":"Melania Trump Will Reveal How America Views Women"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Melania Trump Says She’ll Fight Cyber-Bullying as First Lady","description":"In a rare campaign speech, Melania Trump said that one of her key issues as First Lady would be to combat cyber-bullying","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/iW2WKRtc/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2016-11-03T19:42:09.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/iW2WKRtc.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/4608959/melania-trump-first-lady-politics/","duration":"PT40S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/4608959/melania-trump-first-lady-politics/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```