Melania Trump modelled in US prior to getting work visa, documents show

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Melania Trump, the wife of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, speaks during a rally for her husband in Pennsylvania. Photo: AFP

Published: 1:15pm, 5 Nov 2016Updated: 9:30pm, 5 Nov 2016

Melania Trump was paid for 10 modelling jobs in the United States worth US$20,056 that occurred in the seven weeks before she had legal permission to work in the country, according to detailed accounting ledgers, contracts and related documents from 20 years ago provided to The Associated Press.

The details of Mrs Trump’s early paid modelling work in the US emerged in the final days of a bitter presidential campaign in which her husband, Donald Trump, has taken a hard line on immigration laws and those who violate them. Trump has proposed broader use of the government’s E-verify system allowing employers to check whether job applicants are authorised to work. He has noted that federal law prohibits illegally paying immigrants.

Mrs Trump, who received a green card in March 2001 and became a US citizen in 2006, has always maintained that she arrived in the country legally and never violated the terms of her immigration status. During the presidential campaign, she has cited her story to defend her husband’s hard line on immigration.

The wife of the Republican presidential nominee, who sometimes worked as a model under just her first name, has said through an attorney that she first came to the US from Slovenia on August 27, 1996, on a B1/B2 visitor visa and then obtained an H-1B work visa on October 18, 1996.

The documents obtained by the AP show she was paid for 10 modelling assignments between September 10 and October 15, during a time when her visa allowed her generally to be in the US and look for work but not perform paid work in the country. The documents examined by the AP indicate that the modelling assignments would have been outside the bounds of her visa.