US first lady Melania Trump is the subject of fresh speculation, mostly for what she hasn’t been doing.

Trump has kept a low profile throughout much of 2026. But she hasn’t even been seen in public, let alone accompanying husband President Donald Trump, for nearly a month – including at several high-profile events.

Melania missed the funeral of Republican senator Lindsey Graham, and she wasn’t at the second incarnation of the reimagined White House Correspondents’ Association dinner. On July 22, when Trump, as US commander in chief, received the remains of four service members killed in conflict, she wasn’t by his side.

The last time Melania accompanied her husband to anything official was the July 19 FIFA World Cup final at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey.

In fact, the Daily Beast audited Melania’s calendar and found she’d been seen in public on just 38 days in 2026 – about once every six days.

The glaring absence has been noticed by many, including late night TV host Jimmy Fallon.

“She hasn’t been seen in public for 29 days,” he said on Monday (US time), reading from news reports.

“Trump heard and was like, ‘Big deal. I haven’t seen her in private for two years’.

“I understand Melania is taking a step back with everything going on. She’s worried that at any moment she could be trapped with Trump inside her catering truck,” quipped Fallon, referring to the President’s secret escape from Turkey.

Trump has spent recent weekends at his Trump National Golf Club Bedminster in New Jersey – with Melania nowhere to be seen. She was also notably absent from recent family photographs from Bedminster shared by daughter-in-law Lara Trump.

Now the lack of Melania is being contrasted with the near-constant presence of Trump’s 35-year-old assistant, Natalie Harp.

A video circulating online from last weekend shows Harp with the 80-year-old President as he left Bedminster.

“Here’s video of Donald Trump departing and leaving Bedminster with Natalie Harp by his side. Melania Trump was not there with him!” one user who shared the footage on X wrote.

Harp – a former right-wing TV host and now “special assistant and executive assistant” to Trump – is frequently at his side. She is said to be unwavering in her support for him.

In the 2024 presidential campaign, Harp became known as the “human printer” because – as The New York Times reported at the time – she carried a portable printer to quickly get positive news to Trump.

She reportedly credits laws passed in Trump’s first term with saving her from “rare and terminal” bone cancer.

“When I failed the chemotherapies that were on the market, no one wanted me in their clinical trials,” Harp said in a 2020 speech to the Republican National Convention.

“They didn’t give me the right to try experimental treatments, Mr President. You did, and without you, I’d have died waiting for them to be approved.”

Former White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt once said Harp is one of the “most loyal and hardest-working aides on President Trump’s team”.

Harp’s presence came to wider attention at the weekend, when Senator Jon Ossoff, a Georgia Democrat who is running for reelection, brought her name up at a campaign rally. Among multiple swipes, Ossoff called Trump a “draft-dodging crook President” and said he wanted to “build his ballroom and travel with Natalie to their apparently defenceless flying palace gifted by the Emir of Qatar”, rather than do the job of president.

“I’ve heard this particular aide referred to as his security blanket. And I think we could say that about any number of the senior aides in the White House. They’re not telling him what he needs to hear. They’re telling him what he wants to hear. And the nation is at war. And we cannot afford that,” Ossoff later told MS NOW.

The notoriously sensitive Trump was quick to hit back.

“You mean Pee-wee Herman? Pee-wee Herman look-alike?” he said when asked about the comments on Monday (US time).

But Trump also got angry, personally attacking senior White HOuse Correspondent  Kristen Holmes, from CNN, when she sought a response to Ossoff’s comments.

“Quiet, quiet, quiet. You’re very disrespectful,” he snapped.

“Fake news, you’re fake news, you’re a loud boisterous person. You’re fake news. Be quiet. Be quiet. You’re a fake reporter and you report fake news.”

Further to Fallon’s reference to Trump’s catering truck escapade, CBS reports that Harp was among a handful of the President’s team to join him on the secret plane as he left Turkey in July.

Others on the secret flight included Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth and White House aides Walt Nauta and Dan Scavino. Several of Trump’s senior team were left on the decoy plane, along with other staff and media.