Melania Trump’s “I don’t Care” Jacket Sparks Controversy Regarding US-Mexico Border Crisis

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Melania Trump recently took a trip the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas to visit an immigrant children’s shelter. Normally, a move like this would result in some positive attention regarding the First Lady. However, Melania’s choice of wardrobe to and from her border visit caused some scrutiny of her character and grabbed most of the attention of her trip.

As the First Lady boarded her plane, she sported an olive-green jacket that said “I really don’t care. Do u?” on the back in large white lettering. Naturally, this raised some turmoil, seeing that much of the nation’s recent attention has been focused on the Trump Administration and its disregard for families currently being separated at the US-Mexico border. Now, it is known that Melania Trump is a former fashion model. This is perhaps the reason behind most of her publicly worn outfits being very specifically appropriate for whatever event or situation she is attending. That said, given her tradition of dressing for the occasion, it is hard to not perceive this odd choice of wardrobe as some sort of message or statement concerning the immigration issues and the US-Mexico border.

The office of the First Lady and President Trump both came out very soon after pictures of Melania in the jacket spread and explained the meaning of it in slightly different manner. The office of FLOTUS publicly said it meant nothing and that it was “just a jacket.” On the other hand, President Trump came out (on Twitter) and responded, saying that the jacket was a message to the fake news media, and how the First Lady officially does not care what dishonest things they have to say about her. Considering both of these explanations, it is still hard to perceive why Melania found this specific point in time appropriate to wear a jacket with the aforementioned phrase on it, keeping in mind the controversy surrounding the separation of families.

On top of this jacket being identified as a $39 Zara brand jacket on their line from last year, it also seems worth mentioning that the day Melania decided to wear it in public it was nearing 80 degrees at Andrews Air Force Base where she boarded her plane. Being generally known for wearing nice and generally pricey, event-appropriate clothes raises even more speculation behind this odd choice of jacket. No matter what her reasoning for wearing the jacket was, she could not have chosen a more inconvenient and inappropriate time to decide to show it off.

If the jacket was simply “just a jacket,” as the office of FLOTUS stated, then it in no way excuses why Melania chose to wear it when she did. She was on her way to visit lost, frightened, and lonely children who have been torn from their families. Yes, she did not wear the jacket during the actual visit with these kids, but she did not have to in order to actually show how much she cared about what she was doing.

Looking at President Trump’s reasoning does not portray the First Lady in good taste, either. Melania hypothetically choosing to wear this jacket to send a message to the media paints her in an even more selfish and apathetic manor.

It is agreed that using tragedy to push your beliefs or views onto others is wrong and selfish. This is exactly what Melania would be doing if this story was the real reason she wore this jacket. The administration should be focused on the victims and the children of the border crisis, not using media attention to portray a personal belief.

The bottom line is that, no matter what the circumstances were, Melania should have left the jacket at home. No matter what story the nation and the media are given regarding the reasoning for the First Lady’s wardrobe choice, everyone will still have the reason they originally thought she wore it- and that was to express her and the 1 percent’s collective lack of interest in the border crisis and its victims. It proves to be quite difficult to look at it from any other angle when she literally wore a jacket clearly stating she does not care while boarding a plane to go visit children whom a large majority of the country genuinely believes she does not care about.