Melania Trump ‘renegotiates pre-nup’ as husband Donald’s legal woes pile up

Donald Trump’s wife amends marital agreement to ensure a ‘solid future’ for herself and the couple’s son, Barron, according to a US media report.

Melania Trump, seeking financial security for herself and Barron, is believed to have opened negotiations late last year. Picture: Getty Images

Melania Trump is believed to have “quietly renegotiated” her prenuptial agreement with Donald Trump as he steps up his campaign to take back the White House despite mounting legal difficulties.

Days after a New York judge ruled that Donald Trump had committed fraud for years, illegally inflating his wealth and the value of his real estate empire by billions of dollars, The New York Post reported that Melania had renegotiated the “terms of her marital agreement”. Sources told the newspaper she was anxious to secure her financial future and that of their son, Barron, 17.

“This is at least the third time Melania has renegotiated the terms of her marital agreement,” a source told the Post, which, like The Times, is ultimately owned by News Corporation. “Melania is most concerned about maintaining and increasing a substantial trust for their son Barron.”

Melania and her legal team opened talks to renegotiate her agreement with Trump late last year, around the time the former president was preparing to announce he would again run for the White House, according to the report.

Donald Trump and Melania fly out of Washington on his last day as president in 2021. Picture: Pool/Getty Images

Since then, Trump, 77, has become embroiled in one legal battle after another and now faces four criminal indictments, a series of trial dates and possible imprisonment. Faced with that uncertainty, Melania, 53, has secured a new deal with her husband that covers agreements on money and property, according to an insider close to the couple. They married in 2005.

“It’s not that she threatened to leave him,” the source told the Post. “I know that she wanted it to provide her with more money and also, from what I understand, there’s a specific amount at minimum that Barron is supposed to obtain.”

Trump’s legal woes deepened last week when a judge ruled that he and his company had defrauded banks and insurers for a decade – including during his time as president – by massively inflating the value of his portfolio of skyscrapers, golf courses and luxury hotels. A judge stripped Trump of control of some of his flagship New York properties in the civil lawsuit brought by the state’s attorney-general, Letitia James.

The case is set to go to trial on Monday, with Trump and his two eldest sons, Donald Jr and Eric, summoned as witnesses. The former president could even lose control of Trump Tower in Lower Manhattan if the judgment is upheld.

James is seeking $US250 million ($389m) in damages and a ban on the Trumps doing business in New York.

Barron Trump is now 17. The new deal includes agreements on money and property. Picture: AFP/Getty Images

Trump has denied all the charges against him and railed at the ruling, denouncing it as a “scam” and “un-American”. He insists that the case, like the criminal indictments against him, has been orchestrated by his political enemies to derail his campaign for the White House.

Melania has been an elusive figure since the Trumps left the White House in 2021. Her last appearance alongside her husband – still the Republican presidential frontrunner, despite the many legal controversies – was at the Easter brunch at their Florida estate of Mar-a-Lago.

Trump frequently mentions her at political rallies, claiming that his wife is appalled at the criminal indictments against him, but Melania has not joined him on the campaign trail nor attended his court appearances.

Insiders say she has retreated to a close circle of friends but remains close to the former president.

“She’s very important to the Trump family,” R. Couri Hay, a New York publicist and acquaintance of Melania, told The Times last month. “The former president relies on her advice and her support but it’s all done very privately.”

She spends much of her time with her parents and is “looking at colleges” for Barron, Hay added.

Speculation about the couple’s relationship and Melania’s view of Trump’s policies was fuelled from the very outset of his presidency in 2017, when she chose to stay in Manhattan to let Barron finish his school year in New York at a cost of $US125,000 a day for the additional security.

The Times