On Thursday, first lady Melania Trump hosted the unveiling of a US Postal Service stamp honoring former first lady Barbara Bush at the White House, with former President George W. Bush noticeably absent.
A number of Bush family members and friends, including Neil Bush and Dorothy Bush Koch, packed the East Room to honor the former first lady, who died in 2018 at the age of 92.
Dorothy Bush Koch, the youngest child of the 41st president and first lady, discussed her mother’s role in transforming the White House into a “true home.”
Melania Trump, who has had few public appearances in Washington during her husband’s first three months in office, praised Barbara Bush’s political and family life.
“Mrs. Bush’s legacy is marked by her respect for tradition while also breaking with convention,” Trump said of her mother.
The other Bush children, George W. Bush and Jeb Bush, did not attend the event.
George W. Bush, who has kept a low profile after leaving office, attended President Donald Trump’s inauguration earlier this year. He sat alongside former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, former President Bill Clinton, and former President Barack Obama.
However, he has generally kept Trump, a fellow Republican, at arm’s length, and the two have a history of mutual criticism.
ABC News contacted George W. Bush’s office for comment on Thursday’s event.
George W. Bush did not support Donald Trump in any of his presidential campaigns. In 2020, he stated that he did not vote for Donald Trump or Joe Biden, but rather for Condoleezza Rice, his secretary of state from 2005 to 2009.
He and his father, the late President George H.W. Bush, criticized Trump in a 2017 book, expressing concern about his impact on the Republican Party and conservative values. George W. Bush condemned the brand of politics embraced by Trump and his supporters in a rare public speech that same year, but did not specifically mention Trump by name.
Barbara Bush once said of Trump, “I don’t understand why people are for him.”
Trump’s criticism of the Bush family escalated during the 2016 Republican presidential primary, when he attacked Jeb Bush as “low energy.” He later boasted of defeating the “Bush Dynasty” following his election victory.
Trump has also repeatedly criticized George W. Bush’s response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the Iraq War.
“Bush led an unsuccessful and uninspiring presidency. “He should not be lecturing anyone!” Trump said in 2021, following George W. Bush’s 20th anniversary speech in which he warned that domestic terrorism posed an equal threat to foreign terrorists.
