Donald Trump’s wife, Melania, and his ever-present, always-smiling aide, Natalie Harp, both attended the Freedom 250 Grand Prix. But on the White House’s social media, the president’s blonde cheerleader was almost nowhere to be found.
Harp, 35, is paid $150,000 a year in her capacity as an aide to Trump, 80. She travels almost everywhere with him, sits in on most Oval Office meetings, and helps with his Truth Social posts.
Though she was visible in numerous photographs and videos taken at the Washington, D.C. event on Sunday, she didn’t make it into the official White House or First Lady-branded social content.
In a jerkily edited video set to frenzied strings and posted by the White House, the first lady, and the official Freedom 250 GP Instagram, the footage cycles through moments from the race, closely cropping the president and first lady while largely excluding everyone else.
Another video, of Trump waving the green flag to start the race, is cropped so tightly on the president that it appears almost without context.
On X, the same footage of Trump waving the flag is also visibly cropped, less tightly this time to include Melania, but half of the Fox Sports logo is missing.
The original footage, however, briefly shows Harp in the background, smiling and clapping. In a longer Fox Sports clip from the start of the race, Harp can be spotted for about three seconds.
The White House X account has that clip available, but she’s missing from subsequent images of Trump with the flag.
The White House did not immediately respond to the Daily Beast’s request for comment.
Harp—who has attracted media attention over the past week after Democratic Sen. Jon Ossof made a very public remark about her relationship with the president—is reportedly on shaky ground with Melania, who has been largely absent from the White House of late.
Sunday’s visuals only fueled reports that the first couple has butted heads over Harp’s apparent obsession with Trump, with Melania at one point seeming to depart the suite as Harp entered it.
Letters Harp wrote to Trump in 2023 were published by the Daily Beast on Thursday amid questions about Harp’s security clearance and relationship with Trump.
In the letters, she talks about being “unworthy” of Trump and says: “You are all that matters to me. I don’t want to ever let you down.”
Harp is known as Trump’s “Human Printer,” a nickname that stems from her habit of carrying around printouts of articles and social media posts that please the president.
The New York Times correspondent Maggie Haberman, however, has dubbed her Trump’s “human binkie” for the calming effect she reportedly has on the president.
