President Donald Trump said Tuesday in an address before Republican lawmakers that first lady Melania Trump is no fan of when he dances in public, calling it ‘not presidential.’
‘My wife hates when I do this,’ Trump said Tuesday at the Kennedy Center during an address at the House GOP Member Retreat.
‘She’s a very classy person, right? She said, ‘It’s so unpresidential.’ I said, ‘but I did become president.’ … She hates when I dance. I said, ‘Everybody wants me to dance.’’
”Darling, it’s not presidential,” he continued of what the first lady tells him.
Trump dancing became a hallmark of 2024 campaign rallies, with Trump routinely kicking off and ending public events by dancing, frequently while the Village People’s ‘Y.M.C.A’ or Lee Greenwood’s ‘God Bless the U.S.A.’ blasted in the background. The signature dance typically includes Trump making a fist and shimmying his arms back and forth while pointing to people in the crowd.
The president has previously mentioned the first lady did not approve of his rally dancing, recounting to crowds of supporters in 2023 in Iowa that: ‘She said, ‘Darling, I love you, I love you, but this is not presidential. You don’t dance off the stage. This is not presidential.”
Trump continued Tuesday that the first lady had pressed him that past presidents did not dance solo on political stages, pointing to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt as an example of how presidents should conduct themselves.
‘She actually said, ‘Could you imagine FDR dancing,’’ he continued. ‘She said that to me.’
‘And I said, ‘There’s a long history that perhaps she doesn’t know because he was an elegant fellow, even as a Democrat.’
‘He was quite elegant, but he wouldn’t be doing this. But nor would too many others. But she said, ‘Darling, please, the weightlifting is terrible.’ And I have to say this, the dancing, they really like,’ Trump said of supporters who enjoy his rally dance routines.
‘She said, ‘They don’t like it. They’re just being nice to you,” Trump recounted.
‘I said, ‘that’s not right,” he continued.
Trump’s comments on the first lady’s dislike of his dancing came amid him impersonating weightlifters while discussing biological males competing against biological females. Trump has said in public before that Melania Trump does not approve of him imitating weightlifters, as well as dancing during political events.
Trump’s address before the group of Republican lawmakers follows a historic and busy weekend, when he confirmed the U.S. military carried out a successful strike in Venezuela and captured the nation’s former dictatorial president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife.
The pair, as well as others entrenched in the regime, were charged with narco-terrorism conspiracy charges. The couple pleaded not guilty in a New York City court Monday and are being held in a prison in Brooklyn.
Tuesday’s event, however, is more focused on the party’s agenda for the coming year, as lawmakers prepare for the wild midterm season that will pick up steam in the coming months.
Trump capped off his address by clapping and dancing to the ‘Y.M.C.A.’ as he walked offstage.