A life-size bronze statue of First Lady Melania Trump has been stolen from a field near her hometown of Sevnica, Slovenia. The sculpture, commissioned as a replacement for an earlier wooden version destroyed in an arson attack, was severed at the ankles and removed from its mount on a tree stump.
Authorities have launched an investigation. No suspects have been identified, and the motive remains unclear. However, this is not the first time a statue of Mrs. Trump has been targeted in the region. The original wooden version — unveiled in July 2019 and designed to resemble her powder-blue Inauguration Day dress — was burned on July 4, 2020. The artist, Brad Downey, replaced it with the bronze replica two months later.
Downey, who is American, expressed disappointment over the theft and suggested it may have been politically motivated, possibly in connection with the 2024 U.S. presidential election and Donald Trump’s reelection.
Police spokeswoman Alenka Drenik Rangus confirmed to the AP on Friday that the theft was reported on May 13 and an investigation is underway. The statue stood on a tree stump in a private field near Sevnica, the town where Melanija Knavs (now Melania Trump) was born in 1970. Police say they have no suspects.
The artist told the AFP he learned about the incident while working on a new project in Germany and told said he is “a bit sad that it’s gone.”
“My feeling is that it has something to do with the new election… but who knows, right?” he said.
Neither Melania nor President Donald Trump ever visited the site. A separate 26-foot wooden statue of Trump — complete with two faces, one “nice,” one “vampire,” also met a fiery end in the country.
Local reception to both statues has been ambivalent at best. The original was met with ridicule by some Sevnica residents, one of whom compared it to the cartoon character Smurfette. Others dismissed it as a national embarrassment. While Melania Trump is Slovenian by birth, her symbolic presence in her home country has triggered a mix of indifference, satire, and in some cases, outright hostility.
The theft adds to a pattern of vandalism and public dissent surrounding monuments dedicated to American political figures abroad — especially those viewed through a polarizing lens.
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