Thread: Melania Trump visa: Republican's wife denies rule break

Melania Trump visa: Republican's wife denies rule break

1 hour ago

Melania Trump, the wife of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, has rejected suggestions that she violated visa rules when she started working as a model in New York.

In a statement she said she had followed immigration laws "at all times".

Mrs Trump has yet to clarify what type of visa she used during a 1995 photo shoot in New York.

Mr Trump has taken a hard line on illegal immigration in his campaign.

So far, the Trump campaign has refused to say exactly which visas Mrs Trump had, and when she had them.

The development comes during a turbulent week for the billionaire property developer.

There are reports of deep divisions in the Republican Party after a series of controversial statements by the nominee.

Mrs Trump said she began working as a model in the US in 1996, but nude photos published at the weekend by a New York tabloid appear to have been taken in 1995 for a now defunct French magazine.

BBC Washington correspondent Gary O'Donoghue says this discrepancy has raised questions about her immigration status at the time and whether she had the right to work.

The owner of one modelling agency, Paolo Zampolli, says he sponsored Mrs Trump for an H1B work visa in 1996.

She has said that she had to go back to her native Slovenia every few months to renew her permit - something that is only generally necessary for tourist and business visas that do not permit work.

Our correspondent says the confusion has the potential to do significant damage to Mr Trump's campaign, given his robust views on illegal immigrants.

He has also railed against the use of the H1B visa specifically, suggesting abuse of it is widespread and rampant.

Mr Trump was formally adopted last month as the Republican candidate for November's presidential election.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-36981502

If you are doing work for a French company and the location of the photo-shoot happens to be selected to be New York, why would you need a work permit from the US? You would need a business visa for the business trip seems to me. You're here on a business trip for a foreign contract.

I think the Media is knocking themselves out trying to discredit the Trump family, Trump businesses, and Donald Trump. One would just have to ask why? What is your goal besides the obvious, which is to try to defame this great family with innuendo and false implications to swing the election to Crooked Hillary.

If any of you think there is any nobility in that, you are tragically mistaken. It just reveals the bias, the dishonesty, the unfairness, and the corruption of the Mainstream Media to try to defeat a candidate who wants to fix the United States by reversing the horrible policies that have caused this great decline of a once great nation.

SHAME ON YOU ALL.

STAY TRUE! STAY TRUMP!

SAVE AMERICA!

VOTE FOR DONALD J TRUMP FOR PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES!

This is pathetic nit picking - they are going back 20 yrs. She & Trump didn't even know each other at the time. Democratic sites are filled with just utter nonsense talk, degrading pettiness & personal attacks.

The recent spread of nude art shots involving Melania from that time period all over front pages, shows no consideration for young Barron Trump, 10 yrs old. That kind of stuff should be off limits in a presidential campaign.

She is from Europe, their beaches are topless, the mores' are different there. She considered the photographer someone of standing that could help her career. That time period was filled with pushing things to the max, more daring the better, more attention it would bring.

The media is trying so hard to discredit the Trump family, it's so obvious.

This is the same media that has ignored all of the Clinton scandals. The same media that has edited audio tapes and on an on. It is not media, it is propaganda and folks are going to get fed up with the shenanigans fast.

The 2 just published exposes of the clintons sexual misdeeds should be front page!

If the press is going to stoop to low levels with Trump, Bill's vicious rapes, his daily pick ups while jogging around the WH should be front page. Hillary & her female sexual preferences & most of all how she degraded his victims & hounded his mistresses.

And even more important is their level of corruption & the daily proof that is coming out - the media does not touch it.

We are so overdue for a clean sweep of all these clinton, obama scoundrels and what they have brought us. Our press is controlled by them! Is this America anymore?

They have certainly done their best to replace us with any criminal from south of the border or fanatic foreign muslims. Asians walking @ with dust masks on, women/girls with tightly wrapped heads, men wearing long dresses or whatever that garb is. They don't wear pants like American men do.

Walking the streets, visiting different areas, everything has changed - it is like you are in a foreign country, no one is speaking English.

Look how they treated Pat Smith, Gold Star Family, versus Khizr Khan, Gold Star Family. That tells you the corrupt bias, the dishonest and evil manipulation of the news to the point of creating news based on falsehoods. Trump never disrespected the Khan family in any way, shape or form. Clinton lies to Smith, deceives her, then ignores her, then the media doesn't even cover Smith's speech at the Convention. Also, they showed almost none of the speech of Jamiel Shaw whose son was killed by an illegal alien.

The Media is rotten to the core.

They are obviously stackin' the deck against Trump. Everyday there is some sort of disparaging story front page - nobody likes him says the chamber of commerce, his own party wants to take him out, etc. etc. It is so easy to smear someone when you have control over the press. People keep reading & hearing all this negative, untrue talk & they start to believe it and that is why it is done. Lowest form of journalism, corrupt and filled with untruths.

The latest on Melania's work visa from 20 yrs ago......the photographer has probably made a good $$$ for releasing those photos, he would be the one with rights to them AND HE NEVER PAID FOR HER TO SIT FOR THOSE SHOTS. She did it to build her portfolio with a known photographer.

Former modeling agent says he got Melania Trump's visa

Updated: August 4, 2016 — 5:46 PM EDT
by CHAD DAY, JEFF HORWITZ and ALICIA A. CALDWELL, TAP

WASHINGTON (AP) - Melania Trump's former modeling agent says she obtained a work visa before she modeled professionally in the United States in the mid-1990s. Those comments came Thursday in response to questions about Mrs. Trump's own remarks that appeared inconsistent with U.S. immigration rules.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Paolo Zampolli offered the most detailed description yet of how the wife of the Republican presidential nominee came into the country.

Donald Trump's presidential campaign repeatedly declined to clarify her comments. The campaign also declined to discuss Mrs. Trump's immigration history in detail or provide copies of any paperwork that would put the issue to rest.

Donald Trump has made illegal immigration a signature plank in his campaign platform, and his wife has often cited her path to U.S. citizenship in defense of his hard line, saying she came to the U.S. legally and other aspiring Americans should follow her example.

Zampolli said that while he was a partner at modeling agency Metropolitan Models, he secured a work visa for Mrs. Trump, who in the mid-1990s was named Melania Knauss.

"I know she was not working a paid job before she got the H-1B," Zampolli said, referring to the type of work visa that U.S. companies can obtain for "fashion models of distinguished merit and ability." H-1B visas generally allow a person to work and live in the U.S. for three years with the opportunity to renew the visas for another three years.

Zampolli said he based the H-1B application on Mrs. Trump's previous modeling work in Paris and Milan. "We used whatever she did before to get her a visa," he said. "She had enough tear sheets to qualify."

In interviews earlier this year with MSNBC and for a profile in Harper's Bazaar, Mrs. Trump's comments appeared to be inconsistent with holding a work visa.

"I never thought to stay here without papers. I had a visa. I traveled every few months back to the country to Slovenia to stamp the visa," she said during the MSNBC interview.

U.S. immigration law did not require such trips that Mrs. Trump describes for work-visa holders at the time. People who hold visitor visas would be required to leave the country on or before the end date of their authorized stay. U.S. law does not allow someone to use a visitor visa to regularly live and work in the country.

Mrs. Trump published a statement on Twitter on Thursday, disputing that she violated immigration laws. "I have at all times been in full compliance with the immigration laws of this country. Period. Any allegation to the contrary is simply untrue," she wrote.

Mrs. Trump has said she came to the U.S. in 1996 on a visa, got her green card in 2001 and became a U.S. citizen in 2006, the year after she married Donald Trump.

In her statement, Mrs. Trump did not specify which visa she held during the early part of her modeling career in New York.

Zampolli said Thursday he believes Mrs. Trump was confused about her visa requirements, noting that she traveled to Slovenia to visit her family multiple times.

Zampolli said he was not aware whether Mrs. Trump ever held a different visa. He said it was possible she came to the U.S. on a visitor visa to check out the modeling agency, a practice he said was common when foreign models were considering making the jump to New York.

"They come to meet the client to see if they really should come to New York," he said, noting that the process often includes taking photos to build a portfolio to attract bigger-name modeling contracts.

In her statement, Mrs. Trump did not address reports in Bloomberg News, Politico and The Washington Post speculating whether nude photos taken of her in New York in 1995 were evidence that she had worked illegally in the U.S. before securing the appropriate visa.

U.S. law allows a person to use a visitor visa to conduct temporary business for a foreign company or explore a future career opportunities such as visiting modeling agencies or meeting with potential clients.

Zampolli, who didn't book the shoot, said the photos, which appeared in the French magazine Max, were likely a "free shoot to build the book of the model. She needed to get her tear sheets."

The AP left a phone message Thursday with the photographer who took the photos, but it was not immediately returned. The photographer, Jarl Ale de Basseville, told The Washington Post that Trump was not paid for the photo shoot.

http://www.philly.com/philly/news/po...0c672a412.html

Well, how about that??!! A well-researched, well-explained, knowledgeable piece of actual journalism from the Associated Press. Thank you very very much for clearing up this issue. And thank you Philadephia Inquirer and philly.com for publishing it and to artist for posting here on our Forum!!

ByTIERNEY SNEEDPublishedAUGUST 5, 2016, 10:21 AM EDT

Amid scrutiny of Melania Trump's immigration status when she first came to the United States, an anti-Trump political action committee announced Thursday that it was filing a public records request for her immigration records.

The group, Democratic Coalition Against Trump, which is made of Democratic officials as well as activists, said Thursday it planned to request “any document that indicates the type of visa applied for or issued to Melania Trump from January 1, 1995 until she received her green card in 2001."

“After learning that Mrs. Trump might not have followed the law on her path to U.S. citizenship, the Coalition decided to take action,” Jon Cooper, the chairman of the organization said in a statement. “How ironic would it be if Mr. Trump, who has largely based his presidential run on his ridiculously extreme proposals related to illegal immigration, had actually married an illegal immigrant,” Cooper continued. “That would just go to show that Mr. Trump has been and always will be one thing: a hypocrite.”

Politico published a report Thursday raising questions about how Trump had described the process by which she immigrated to the United States when she was working as a model in the 1990s. Trump has said throughout her husband's campaign that during that period of her career she traveled back to her home country Slovenia every few months to have her visa re-stamped. The Politico report pointed out that the process she described resembled that used by immigrants with a tourist visa, which prohibits working in the United States. A work visa is valid for three to six years, and wouldn't have required Trump to return to Slovenia regularly to have it re-stamped.

Trump has denied that she broke any immigration laws, but the campaign has not provided specific details about the circumstances of her immigration.

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewir...public-records