First lady Melania Trump will travel to Texas this weekend to attend the private funeral services for former first lady Barbara Bush.
CNN first reported Trump’s travel plans.
‘Mrs. Trump intends to pay her respects to Barbara Bush and the entire family at the funeral on Saturday,’ Mrs. Trump’s Communications Director Stephanie Grisham told DailyMail.com.
The late Barbara Bush’s (left) funeral will be attended by first lady Melania Trump (right) her spokeswoman said on Wednesday
Reporters will not be allowed to attend Bush’s private funeral service alongside the current first lady her spokeswoman also confirmed.
‘The event will not be pooled as this is about paying tribute to Mrs. Bush,’ Grisham said.
Trump is following in the footsteps of her predecessors, most recently first lady Michelle Obama, who attended the funeral services for former first lady Nancy Reagan in March 2016.
Hillary Clinton, in her position as first lady in 1994, attended the services held for the late Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis.
President Obama did not attend Reagan’s funeral, as he was already scheduled to attend a Democratic Party fundraiser in Austin held in conjunction with the South by Southwest festival.
But President Bill Clinton eulogized Kennedy, calling her a ‘remarkable woman whose life will forever glow in the lives of her fellow Americans,’ according to the New York Times’ account.
‘God gave her very great gifts and imposed upon her great burdens,’ Clinton also said. ‘She bore them all with dignity and grace and uncommon common sense.’
The White House has yet to say whether President Trump will join the first lady, nor have spokespeople returned requests for comment regarding whether additional figures from the Trump administration plan to attend.
The funeral will take place at St. Martin’s Church in Houston, where Barbara Bush was a longtime member.
On Friday, the public can pay their respects to Bush at the church from noon until midnight.
And then Saturday there will be a private service with approximately 1,500 guests, including Melania Trump.
The dynamic between the Bushes and the Trumps – despite being members of the same political party – is an awkward one, as President Trump is widely credited with killing former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush’s 2016 campaign, labeling the late Barbara Bush’s son ‘low energy.’
In an interview on Fox Business Network on Wednesday morning, former first lady Laura Bush suggested that Melania Trump had tried to bury the hatchet.
‘She invited me to tea at the White House,’ Laura Bush said. ‘She’s a beautiful woman, and very very lovely.’
‘And I think she’ll, I think she will do really very well,’ Laura Bush said of Melania Trump’s handling of the first lady’s duties.