When covering politics, I try to avoid saying anything bad about a politician's spouse or kids unless they choose to loudly insert themselves into our political discussions, get into politics themselves, or do something criminal. My thinking is that they never signed up for this, and it's not fair to drag them if you dislike a certain member of their family. With former first ladies, for example, I might dislike things they say or joke about them leading cabinet meetings, but I'd never make wild accusations toward them or mock their appearance. That's just not how I roll.
(Hillary Clinton doesn't count.)
Unfortunately, many people, including most in the media, do not seem to feel the same way. On Wednesday, First Lady Melania Trump sat down for a private meeting with freed American-Israeli hostage Keith Siegel.
According to the White House, when Mrs. Trump met with Aviva Siegel, Keith's wife, in January 2025, it led to a series of events that eventually liberated him from Hamas captivity. At that time, Aviva gifted Melania with a homemade book about Keith and the events surrounding October 7, 2023. The first lady shared that book with her own husband later that day. I haven't seen it yet, but apparently, this is documented in her new film, Melania.
"That first meeting with Aviva Siegel served as a catalyst to the events leading up to Keith’s freedom. It was clear that day in New York City that Aviva Siegel’s human spirit would move mountains to rescue her husband, Keith," the first lady said in a statement released by the White House.
"I was deeply moved to hear from the First Lady about the meetings she held with my wife, Aviva, while I was in captivity, and about the strength and support she gave to the families of the hostages throughout that difficult journey," Keith Siegel said in the same statement.
Aviva Siegel, who was also a part of Wednesday's meetings, said, "I want to express my deepest gratitude to First Lady Melania Trump. Meeting again today feels profoundly full circle… I am endlessly grateful for Mrs. Trump’s steadfast support over these painful two years."
None of this comes as a surprise to me. During the early months of Donald Trump's second term, the media went crazy, claiming the first lady was "absent" and creating all sorts of rumors about her and their marriage, even though we all knew she was working on her film and her own business, and ensuring her teenage son also handled the transition well.
But we've also learned along the way that she's had the president's ear on many topics, whether it was freeing Israeli hostages or the Ukrainian children held hostage in Russia. She's already helped about two dozen Ukrainian children, with more in the works, she says. The president said just last week that she's involved behind the scenes and isn't afraid to tell him what she thinks of a situation.
REPORTER: “Has President Putin agreed to release any more Ukrainian children?”
— Fox News (@FoxNews) February 4, 2026
FIRST LADY MELANIA TRUMP: “I'm working on it. I'm working on it and we are in the process, so I hope we have success very soon. I will keep you posted.” pic.twitter.com/w2e3cKhYVP
I'd add that she's careful about the public appearances she makes, and that meeting with Keith and Aviva yesterday was a perfect example of why.
After the meeting, they took a few questions from the press, but many of the reporters had nothing to say about the hostages and opted for rude or awkward questions instead.
A CNN reporter asked her why she felt it was appropriate to use an official White House event — the meeting with Keith and Aviva — to promote her film, which I'm pretty sure she didn't do at all, aside from mentioning that she met with Aviva earlier in the year. I guess it shouldn't, but the mental gymnastics these reporters perform astound me sometimes. Thankfully, the first lady handled it graciously.
"This is not promotion. We are here celebrating the release of the hostages, of Aviva and Keith," she replied. "They were in Washington, D.C., and they called me. They said they would like to come over to thank me and to give me hugs, and that's why we are here. It's nothing to do with promotion."
🚨 BREAKING: Conservatives are calling for this Fake News reporter to have her credentials REVOKED after she ATTACKED First Lady Melania Trump while she met with freed hostages
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) February 4, 2026
"Why do you think it's appropriate to USE a White House event to promote your documentary?!"
Her… pic.twitter.com/wbBP54w2ZV
Another reporter, not sure who it was, opted to use her time to ask the first lady about Ghislaine Maxwell and the Epstein files, which prompted the White House staff to shut down the questions. However, Melania didn't miss a beat.
"We are here celebrating the release and the life of these two incredible people, so let's honor that," she said calmly, with a smile.
I've seen other media outlets describe her as "flustered," but I'll let you determine that for yourselves:
Wow Melania Trump gets a Ghislaine Maxwell question
— Acyn (@Acyn) February 4, 2026
Melania Trump: We are here celebrating the life of these two incredible people. pic.twitter.com/2nbsPV7mOA
But it's not just the media. The film Melania is currently in theaters and performing quite well — despite the fact that Jimmy Kimmel gave a whole monologue last night suggesting the numbers were rigged — but apparently, the losers over at the Lake Theater & Café in Lake Oswego, Ore., can't handle it. It seems as though they were advertising the film on their marquee with smart alec phrases like "To defeat your enemy, you must know them. Melania starts Friday" and "Does Melania wear Prada? Find out Friday."
Apparently, Amazon didn't take too kindly to this and pulled the movie from the theater. "Got a call that the higher ups (i.e., at Amazon) were upset with how our marquee marketed their movie (i.e., Melania), that, per them, Sunday would be its last day here," the staff wrote in an Instagram post. "Also got, before then, countless emails and voicemails and Google / Yelp reviews (Google / Yelp took them down) wondering why the hell we had Melania here, or disdaining our disparaging of her."
We talked about this the other day when I wrote about the comedian whose shows were canceled in Minnesota for doing a Renee Goode joke. Many of you loved the joke. Many of you thought it was tasteless. But almost all of you agreed that you just wouldn't go see the show if you didn't like the guy, just like I'm pretty sure most of us would not go see a documentary called Jill about the former first lady. But would we call up the local theater and hound it to death for playing it or leave nasty reviews for something we've haven't even seen? Nope. We might express our opinions on the tasteless marquee ads as some did, but we respect free speech.
Related: Comedian's Sold-Out Minnesota Shows Canceled... Because He Made a Joke
Anyway, the theater's owner also posted an apology of sorts on its website, explaining why he chose to show the film in the first place. It's more like a mealy-mouthed, groveling exercise in public self-flagellation with jazz hands.
It's incredibly long and rambling, so I'm going to tack it on at the end here. Consider it your informal anthropological field study of how the leftist mind works.
Mostly, I thought doing so would be funny. For some of you, that’s enough. Great! Otherwise…
Financially, the film marketplace this week and next were a desert. The most viable alternative, Send Help, is of a class (R-rated, benignly edgy) that just proved, again, doesn’t do well here: the excellently reviewed, Ralph-Fiennes-starring The Bone Temple made less opening weekend here than the horribly reviewed, just-canceled Melania did. No Other Choice was my plan for this week until it didn’t get a single Oscar nomination, The Secret Agent did get nominations but hasn’t done well anywhere …is there something else you want to see? (The Testament of Ann Lee isn’t doing well anywhere either and I for one found it soo boring, wild to see reviews calling Melania boring and to compare the two for myself: I did not find Melania boring! The woman, yes, the movie, no.)
So, to fill a screen, why not get this inexplicable vanity piece from the current president’s wife? I mean, it just seems so weird that it even exists (who wants a movie about Melania lol?), and wouldn’t it then be exponentially weirder, to the point of being funny, to show it here, at your obviously anti-establishment, occasionally troublemaking, neighborhood cinema? And here’s the thing: I personally wanted to see Melania more than Send Help, and when I’m torn between films for here, I imagine others might think like I do, in which case shouldn’t I get something culturally significant, a signpost of our times, rather than just this week’s (as in, not next week’s) entertainment?
Why did I want to see Melania? This seems to be the question without a reasonable answer for many messaging me. And their main gripe is that if it is a signpost of our times, it is an inescapably toxic one: that showing Melania is necessarily supporting her, this administration, and this administration’s policies. I don’t think this way! I think a lot of people don’t think this way! For me there was no dividing line between wanting to see it and showing it here. Am I trying to get people to vote one way or another? Not really! Am I hoping everyone commits to being open-minded, compassionate, and well-informed? Yeah, kinda! The marquee may seem mean, but my hope, always, is to, though momentarily fanning flames, ultimately lower the temperature.
If you came to see Melania here and bought an $11 ticket, $5.50 of that would go to Amazon / MGM ($8/$4 for seniors). Melania’s already been paid ($28M, they say), so your money ($5.50 or $4) would go to a film company now owned by Jeff Bezos. I watched the trailer for the film and was surprised by its tone, in disbelief that the film itself may accurately portray its subject. Many now call it propaganda but the word did not cross my mind, and, having watched the film, yes, though it has intentional blind spots, this is “Melania” as Melania herself wants to be known, and not everyone will find it flattering. Someone shouted “fascist bitch!” as the trailer played before Hamnet. Okay. Another discreetly unzipped her jacket for me after Melania’s first screening, her shirt beneath reading “Freedom.” These experiences inform my perspective. Now, reader, they inform yours. Some find no need to revise their perspective, I almost always do, endless abaci. We contributed, in all, $196 to the Jeff Bezos Trust Fund this week (far more to the Hamnet Trust Fund, thank you, Hamnet lovers). Jeff Bezos won’t notice the $196. He wouldn’t notice $1,960, though someone on his team noticed our marquee.
And, again, something about this all I find funny. Do I find the upset emails from you funny? No, most leave me sad; sorry to have dismayed, confused, or misdirected you, sorry to have not replied. Is ICE funny? Fuck no. Is Trump? He tries to be. Is that his wife released a documentary in theaters nationwide funny? I think so. If Kamala won, imagine “Douglas” being released this week—I mean, that’s also funny, right?
I do not view our film programming as political. I try to choose films for the community that they want to see. Lake Oswego is diverse, whatever best serves you collectively best serves us (also need people to buy more than tickets, please arrive hungry / thirsty). We may be on Amazon’s black list for awhile, probably no Project Hail Mary, apologies Ryan Gosling fans (not sure how “Josie Alexander” knew that (see below)). I imagine more of our patrons lean left, and this affects our programming, and also probably what I feel comfortable putting on the marquee. Despite outward appearances, Lake Theater & Cafe is into being inclusive, kinda/sorta as long as you are too, we want to meet everyone in the middle. You’re our friends, you know that, right? It’s not us that makes this place special, it’s you. (I mean, we’re pretty special right now, too, Brian + David + Jackie + Cheyenne + Gabe + Adam + Adri + Michael, I love this crew, but I also pretty much love all of you. One of our pizzas is named after one of you! Would name a Pilsner Brian if we could!)
And there are those of you messaging me ostensibly from the right, hi, I’m Jordan, I clean the bathrooms here, I work in the kitchen sometimes, when I’m behind the register I skimp on the butter on your popcorn because I don’t want you to end up with butter stains on your pants, if you want lots of butter though just ask for lots of butter, I do not think Melania is the enemy, I do not think she is the devil, but I think times are messed up in a way that you must be dense to not recognize that the thinking of some on the left gets close to that. I don’t blame Trump personally for this country-wide rift—he was absent from the discourse in Biden’s first couple years and our country still was thoroughly divided then—but I do think Trump plays into it (this was my thinking in putting what I did on the marquee, that his supporters should be okay with my “playful” messaging because part of Trump’s approach, part of Melania’s approach, is to play into their own villainy (Melania less so, but she did wear that “I really don’t care, do u?” jacket to the migrant detention center in 2018, remember that?).
When is the last time you ate caviar out of a gold egg? I never have, but Melania personally oversaw this being on the menu at Trump’s second inauguration. Isn’t that weird? Isn’t that kind of disgusting? Who would want that? Isn’t that almost, maybe kind of, at least to know it, funny?
“Wuthering Heights” starts 2/12.
– Jordan
