The Queen of Ironic Commerce is Back in the Ornament Business
Dahlings, you just can’t make this stuff up. In the gilded, often bizarre circus of post-White House celebrity, Melania Trump has carved out a niche that is so dripping in glorious, high-end irony it belongs in a museum of modern celebrity scandals. Forget your red-tree decor and your dour scowls—her true masterpiece is the Christmas ornament.
We’re barely out of swimsuit season, but the First Lady is already back on the hustle, minting money (and NFTs) with her latest holiday collection. Gone are the days of vaguely themed, slightly confusing 2023 baubles; for 2025, she’s gone full, unironic, brass-and-enamel ‘Celebrating America’.
Celebrate America!
The 250 Collection:
2025 Limited Edition Ornament CollectionAvailable at https://t.co/ZSxDgBwvFR pic.twitter.com/iISXpNvFyo
— USAmemorabilia (@USAmemorabilia) October 1, 2025
Through her perfectly patriotic storefront, USAmemorabilia, which bills itself as the premier platform for American trinkets—a title that, let’s be honest, is already doing some heavy lifting—Melania is peddling six “limited-edition, handcrafted Christmas ornaments” to mark the nation’s upcoming 250th anniversary. Think miniature Mount Rushmore, a pocket-sized Statue of Liberty, and the Empire State Building—all retailing in the distinctly non-festive range of $75 to $90. Because nothing screams holiday spirit like a nearly hundred-dollar piece of Americana that also happens to come with Melania’s signature engraved and the option of a completely unnecessary, utterly fashionable NFT.
It’s the kind of high-concept, aggressively commercial move that makes a Page Six columnist practically weep with glee. It’s not just a business venture; it’s a performance art piece about the price of patriotism.
The Tape That Keeps on Giving
Now, for the delectable dollop of scandal that makes this whole venture a truly Oli Coleman-worthy spectacle: the infamous leaked recording.
Years ago, the world was gifted a peek behind the highly stylized curtain of the White House when Melania’s former aide, Stephanie Winston Wolkoff (of Melania and Me fame), released a tape that has become foundational to the First Lady’s public mythology. It was a moment of supreme, off-the-cuff candor that the public—and the gossip pages—will never let go of.
In the recording, while griping about the enormous and, frankly, tedious task of decorating the People’s House for the holidays, a very frustrated Melania delivered the line that haunts her every subsequent Christmas sale: “I’m working … my a off on the Christmas stuff, that you know, who gives a f*** about the Christmas stuff and decorations? But I need to do it, right?”**
Who gives a f**?*
The collective irony is so thick you could hang one of her $90 ornaments on it. The very thing she expressed such spectacular, profane disdain for is now the central pillar of her post-White House entrepreneurial strategy.
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The sheer, breathtaking reversal from Who gives a f**?* to a full-on embrace of brass-and-enamel commemorative merchandise is the perfect cynical lens through which to view celebrity commerce.
This isn’t just about selling knick-knacks; it’s about selling the brand of Melania Trump as a figure of dignified, traditional American sentiment, all while having a documented, recorded history of finding the entire enterprise an exasperating waste of her time. The market, it seems, has zero memory for context, or perhaps it simply doesn’t care, as long as the product has the requisite signature and a patriotic theme.
She’s selling us Mount Rushmore ($75!) and with it, the beautiful, American lie that she cares deeply about the holiday she once publicly—if accidentally—decried as a burdensome chore. She needed to do it then; she wants to do it now. The difference, quite clearly, is the price tag.
The NFT Factor: When Collectibles Get Cryptic
Adding another layer of absolutely unnecessary modernity to this retro Americana offering is the persistent inclusion of the NFT (Non-Fungible Token) option. Melania has been an enthusiast of the digital collectible space for years, often to the confusion of those outside the crypto-sphere.
For the faithful paying their $75-$90 for a Statue of Liberty ornament, the added option of a digital collectible—a unique piece of code tied to a digital image—is the ultimate celebrity-business-venture flourish. It’s the official recognition that, in the 2020s, a physical signature is nice, but a Solana blockchain digital stamp is forever.
It’s genius, in a slightly unhinged way. She’s catering to the classic collectible market (handcrafted! limited edition!) while simultaneously tapping the high-tech, slightly bubble-prone NFT market. It’s a two-pronged grift attack that perfectly encapsulates the Trump-family brand of maximum monetization across all available platforms.
The Controversy Quotient: Trading on the First Lady Title
Beyond the delicious tape irony, there is the more traditional controversy that swirls around the commercial ventures of former, or current (depending on which way the political winds are blowing), First Spouses.
The ethical line between using one’s political notoriety to earn a living and actively cashing in on a former (or potentially future) official government role is always blurry in America. While many First Ladies have written books or given paid speeches, selling merchandise that directly capitalizes on national landmarks and patriotic holidays—often featuring a facsimile of the official signature she used in the White House—sits firmly in the grey area of leveraging public service for private gain.
But let’s be frivolous for a minute. The real scandal is the cost! At $75 to $90 a pop, these aren’t exactly ornaments for the average American Christmas tree. These are luxury political paraphernalia, designed to be purchased by the most devoted of her husband’s supporters—the same supporters who likely cheered when she was defending her famously “creepy” White House holiday decor against the “fake news” media.
The Celebrity Pattern: Griftmas is an Annual Event
Melania’s ornament operation is part of a larger, repeatable pattern in the world of high-level political celebrity: the aggressive monetization of a brand built on public service. She’s not the only one, but she’s certainly one of the most creatively ironic.
Think of other high-profile celebrity figures who’ve leaned heavily into the merch game: the Kardashians selling high-end versions of the everyday; Gwyneth Paltrow turning a dubious lifestyle brand into a multi-million-dollar empire. The key is to take something ordinary and attach a price-inflating narrative to it.
Melania took the most obligatory, complained-about chore of her time as First Lady—the Christmas decorating—and has turned it into her personal, highly lucrative “Griftmas” holiday tradition. By selling the exact patriotic ‘Christmas stuff’ she allegedly hated doing, she’s proving the ultimate truth of the celebrity sphere: the dollar sign is the ultimate arbiter of value, and a well-placed, profanity-laced scandal just makes the merchandise move faster.
And we, the public, the devoted followers of all things Hollywood and political, buy the story right along with the ornament. Because, at the end of the day, who gives a f*** about the Christmas stuff, unless it’s got a signature, an NFT, and a juicy backstory?
