A UK newspaper promised to pay Melania Trump 'substantial damages' after issuing apology on a mistake-ridden story
- British newspaper The Daily Telegraph has agreed to pay "substantial damages" and issued a full apology after publishing a story with a number of false and misleading statements about first lady Melania Trump.
- "The Mystery of Melania" was a recent cover story that has since been removed from the Telegraph's website.
- The apology's points of correction include details on Trump's family, career and relationship with her husband, President Donald Trump, before her life in the White House.
The Daily Telegraph, a British newspaper, has paid damages and issued an apology for a recent cover story that made a number of false and misleading claims about first lady Melania Trump.
The paper published an apology for a cover story entitled "The Mystery of Melania," which was published last week and included several errors the paper now says should not have been published.
The story, which was written by US journalist Nina Burleigh, has since been removed from the Telegraph's website.
Among the issues with the article pointed out in the paper's statement is that of Trump's father "was not a fearsome presence and did not control the family."
The first lady's education was also apparently misstated, as the apology reads that Trump "did not leave her design and architecture course at university relating to the completion of an exam, as alleged in the article, but rather because she wanted to pursue a successful career as a professional model."
Of her career as a model before she met her husband, the apology clarified that "Trump was not struggling...and she did not advance in her career due to the assistance of Mr. Trump."
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The apology continued: "We accept that Mrs Trump was a successful professional model in her own right before she met her husband and obtained her own modeling work without his assistance."
Other factual errors described in the apology include that the first lady met her husband in 1998, not 1996, in addition to other small points about her life before the White House.
"The article also wrongly claimed that Mrs. Trump's mother, father, and sister relocated to New York in 2005 to live in buildings owned by Mr. Trump," the apology reads. "They did not. The claim that Mrs. Trump cried on election night is also false."
The claim that the first lady cried the night her husband was elected president is not new, as she was previously reported to be visibly upset when he was announced the winner. Her staff has hit back at these reports.
"We apologise unreservedly to the first lady and her family for any embarrassment caused by our publication of these allegations," the apology reads. "As a mark of our regret we have agreed to pay Mrs. Trump substantial damages as well as her legal costs."
The first lady has emerged as a high-profile member of her husband's administration, sparking conspiracy theories and eventually warming up to facing the press alone.
In 2017, she sued the Daily Mail with similar success.