President Donald Trump hit out at Stephen Miller - his deputy White House chief of staff and architect of the administration’s aggressive immigration operation - for going “too far” after first lady Melania Trump complained to her husband, according to a report.
The first lady lamented to Trump that people she knew were being deported in his sweeping anti-immigration campaign, according to The Wall Street Journal. It follows the outlet’s reporting in March that Melania was part of a group of advisers who warned Trump that his immigration policies had crossed a line as tensions flared in Minnesota during raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
A spokesperson for the first lady said that “the allegation about Mrs. Trump’s friends being deported is unfounded and without merit” in a statement to The Independent.
Trump and the Republicans suffered a bruising midterm election defeat after the American people delivered a referendum on the first two years of his second term.
The president lost huge gains he made with Hispanic voters in 2024, with six in 10 nationally saying they voted for the Democratic candidate in their local House race. It follows the administration’s heavy-handed deportation tactics that saw federal agents execute two American citizens in Minneapolis, igniting protests across the country.
Border Patrol officers shot and killed ICU nurse Alex Pretti on January 24 in Minneapolis during an immigration surge, Miller branded him a “domestic terrorist” and an “assassin” who “tried to murder federal agents.”
The false claim was echoed by then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, who accused Pretti of committing “an act of domestic terrorism.”
“That’s the facts,” she said. “This looks like a situation where an individual arrived at the scene to inflict maximum damage on individuals and to kill law enforcement.”
Miller also labeled Renee Good a “domestic terrorist” after she was shot and killed in her car by an ICE agent. Miller has been named a defendant in a lawsuit brought Good’s family against the ICE agent and other Trump officials.
On Election Day, Minnesotans went to the spot where Pretti was killed and placed their “I Voted” stickers on a nearby lamppost in his memory.
In March, the Journal reported that Melania was part of discussions with White House chief of staff Susie Wiles and other Trump advisers on how the administration should reset after the violence.
Melania rarely wades into her husband’s politics publicly, but she has been proactive with Russia’s war in Ukraine, brokering a ceasefire in the southern Ukrainian town of Oleshky. The first lady is scheduled to bring Ukrainian and Russian officials together at a White House event Thursday, and is due to give remarks about the ceasefire.
The first lady also spoke out in October 2024 to defend abortion rights while promoting her book, defying the pro-life movement immediately before the presidential election.
“Why should anyone other than the woman herself have the power to determine what she does with her own body?” she wrote in Melania. “A woman’s fundamental right of individual liberty, to her own life, grants her the authority to terminate her pregnancy if she wishes.”
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