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Donald Trump details Melania's key role in the campaign and how Barron could be crucial to 2024 victory
Ask Donald Trump, a man known for putting his family at the heart of his political and his business worlds, whether we will see more of former First Lady Melania on the campaign trail and his eyes light up.
For a moment.
'Well, I would like to. It's not a question of that. It's a nasty world for me,' he said, six weeks after an assassin's bullet ripped through his ear.
'It's not nasty for Democrats like it is for me. And I would like to have my family not have to go out there and go in front of some of the things that you know happen.'
Melania, he said, cares deeply about the country.
Donald Trump sat down with DailyMail.com and talked about his pride in his family's role in his campaign but also his fears for the attacks they have to endure
'She'll do whatever necessary. But my kids haven't been treated properly,' he said. 'She hasn't been treated properly.'
Half the lawns have been ripped up and reseeded. An outbuilding is having its terracotta tiles replaced.
But the living room is a hive of activity, the center of Donald Trump's business and political worlds.
Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law and a key player in his administration and 2020 election campaign, emerges from the tea room after a business meeting.
Corey Lewandowski, who joined the campaign recently as a senior figure, hovers nearby, eyes on his phone.
And Eric Trump, executive vice president of the Trump Organization, comes and goes with the air of a man who spent part of his childhood growing up around the antique Spanish tiles, arches and heraldic reliefs of the club.
Trump sat down with DailyMail.com last Wednesday, part of a strategy of keeping up media pressure on his opponent Kamala Harris who by then had gone 38 days as the Democratic candidate without holding an interview.
It seemed to be a strategy that was working for her. Her fundraising hit record levels and she moved ahead of Trump in national polls, all without risking any awkward questions.
Trump and his team had expected a honeymoon when Democrats ditched 81-year-old Biden and he insisted he was happy with the way his campaign was going.
Trump became animated when he talked about the role of his family in the campaign
Former First Lady has appeared sparingly so far. She is seen here arriving at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in July
Former President Donald Trump, second right, his wife Melania, second left, their son Barron, center, and father-in-law Viktor Knavs, left, stand in front of the Church of Bethesda-by-the-Sea at the start of the funeral of Amalija Knavs, the former first lady's mother, in Palm Beach, Fla., Thursday, Jan. 18, 2024
'You know, they had no bounce on their convention. You saw the numbers,' he said, referring to polls showing Harris did not seemed to have picked up support after a week with the media focused on Democrats in Chicago.
'And the reason is, she won't talk to anybody. So it's either because she can't explain how she changed every single policy she had, or she's incompetent.'
He was still buzzing from Robert J. Kennedy Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard's endorsements, and swatted away questions about how he would recover from falling behind in the polls.
'It's been a great month,' he said. 'I don't understand that question.'
Trump does not usually do interviews in the Mar-a-Lago living room. Its gold leaf ceiling, modeled on the 'Thousand-Wing Ceiling' of the Accademia in Venice, is a glittering distraction with its shimmering sunbursts.
The walls are adorned with vast silk needlework panels from a Venetian Palace, all acquired by the home's original owner Marjorie Merriweather Post, who left it to the nation as a 'Winter White House.'
That is what it became when Trump took office in 2017, hosting world leaders and running his administration in between rounds of golf during weekends away from Washington.
Trump made news in the interview, saying he had reservations about Florida's six-week abortion law, hinting that he might vote in favor of a referendum to expand abortion access. Two days later, he reversed position
The interview took place in the spectacular living room, seen here in 1967
Trump holds his fist aloft as his father speaks at a campaign rally at Trump National Doral Miami, Tuesday, July 9, 2024, in Doral, Fla
These days Trump is too busy for a full 18 holes. Instead, with the campaign in full swing, he said he had just managed to hit a few balls at his West Palm Beach golf club (about a 10-minute drive away) before sitting down with DailyMail.com.
In the meantime, he has been experimenting with a new audience, engaging with YouTubers and other kinds of online 'influencers,' thanks to his own, in-house expert on Gen Z: 18-year-old son Barron.
'He knows so much about it,' said said, his eyes brimming with paternal pride. 'Adin Ross, you know, I mean, I do some people that I wasn't so familiar with, different generation. He knows every one of them. And we've had tremendous success.'
The livestream with Ross was filmed at Mar-a-Lago and had more than 580,000 live viewers at its peak, making it the third most concurrently viewed stream on the Kick platform this year.
Trump cut a relaxed figure as he picked out a playlist in a Tesla Cyber Truck, and even danced with Ross at the end.
He also showed a different side of himself when he appeared on Barron Trump's favorite podcast, This Past Weekend with Theo Von, at one point discussing the finer points of alcohol and illegal narcotics.
'Is cocaine a stronger up?' the former president asked.
Trump discussed everything from the after effects of a bullet slicing through his ear to policy and the state of the campaign in an exclusive interview
Former President Donald Trump ripped Vice President Kamala Harris for her legal record while appearing with livestreamer Adin Ross on his Kick show
Trump was also recently interviewed by Theo Von for his podcast, one of the impacts of Barron Trump's influencer network as they try to court the Gen Z vote
He lags his rival among younger voters, according to the latest J.L. Partners/DailyMail.com poll. It found that 32 percent of 18 to 29-year-olds plan to vote for Trump, compared with 48 percent for Harris (although Trump holds a two-point lead overall.'
But Barron is helping try to bridge that gap by using platforms that were new to Trump, who stumbled over the specifics as he tried to describe them.
'We did three unusual .. I don't know what you'd call them, but it's a platform with three people that I don't know, but three people that Barron knows very well,' he said.
'He actually calls all of them like friends of his, because it's a different generation. They don't grow up watching television the same way as we did. They grow up looking at the Internet or watching a computer, right?'
Like his protective mother, Barron has appeared with his father sparingly.
Melania has picked her moments carefully. She received a thunderous reception at the party convention in Milwaukee and issued a public statement in the wake of the attempt on her husband's life, calling on people to remember that love was worth more than political differences.
As far as Trump is concerned it is one thing for him to take the bullets and the brickbats, another for his family to be in the firing line.
'My kids gave up so much, and all they did is get accused of Russia, Russia, Russia and all these hoaxes, you know, misinformation, disinformation,' he said.
'I don't want them to be hurt by the horrible things that Democrats are willing to do.'