Melania takes Air Force jet to Mar-a-Lago on the same day Trump grounds Nancy Pelosi's overseas trip
First Lady Melania Trump reportedly used an Air Force jet to travel to Mar-a-Lago on Thursday, the same day that President Donald Trump grounded House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's government plane to Afghanistan, citing the ongoing government shutdown.
Reports state that the CilMilAir Twitter account spotted an Air Force plane with the call sign EXEC1F approaching Florida on Thursday evening. The particular call sign is associated with a plane carrying the first lady. The Twitter account was the same one that tracked the first couple's trip to Iraq on Christmas when they visited the troops there, according to the Daily Mail.
Trump, a day after Pelosi requested him to postpone the State of Union address, canceled her government-funded trip to Afghanistan, citing the government shutdown. Reports state that Pelosi had been scheduled to visit Brussels and Afghanistan in a top-secret trip, along with other lawmakers from the Congress to meet the American troops stationed there.
The lawmakers were spotted waiting on a bus outside the Longworth House Office Building on Capitol Hill on Thursday afternoon when White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders tweeted a letter from the president informing Pelosi that he had canceled her trip.
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The legislators were reportedly left confused as they tried to confirm details of the president's decision to halt their military aircraft, according to the Daily Mail. Trump's note to Pelosi stated that he was remanding her plane "due to the shutdown." The note sounded similar to Pelosi's request to Trump a day before that he delay his State of the Union speech until after the government reopens.
"We will reschedule this seven-day excursion when the shutdown is over," Trump wrote in the note. "I also feel that, during this period, it would be better if you were in Washington negotiating with me and joining the Strong Border Security movement to end the shutdown."
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Shortly after the incident, Trump's ally, Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, appeared disappointed at the president's move, and said it was “inappropriate” for Trump to cancel Pelosi’s trip “to visit our troops in Afghanistan, our allies in Egypt and NATO.”
“One sophomoric response does not deserve another,” Graham said in a statement. The White House, however, insisted that Trump was not exacting revenge on the Democratic leader.
The president reportedly also canceled his administration's trip to Davos. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin was preparing to lead a presidential delegation of Cabinet members to Davos for next week's World Economic Forum.