It was the anti-Trump super PAC, Make America Awesome, that used a photo that originally was published in a 2000 photo spread in British GQ, and republished on March 4 online by the magazine. The ad read, “Meet Melania Trump. Your Next First Lady. Or, You Could Support Ted Cruz on Tuesday.”
Trump claimed that "that super PAC is very friendly to Ted Cruz. He knew all about it 100 percent. So he started. I didn’t start it."
BALONEY.
It is illegal for the Cruz campaign to coordinate with the super PAC. So what Trump is suggesting would violate federal regulations. If so, why did Trump's team not file suit? The law would be on his side.
And there’s no evidence that the Trump campaign has provided to back up the accusation.
Reporters contacted Condé Nast Britain, which publishes British GQ, and a spokesman told them that the magazine no longer owns the rights to the photos of Melania Trump. So, anybody anywhere could have gotten the photo.
The Ted Cruz campaign DENIED any involvement with Make America Awesome.
Catherine Frazier, a spokeswoman for the Cruz campaign, told The Hill that the campaign didn’t purchase the rights to the photo. “Of course we haven’t and Trump knows it,” she said.
So, if you are going to accuse Cruz and his campaign of starting this bloody internet war, you better provide good evidence of it.
The photos of Melania (Knauss) Trump’s GQ photo shoot are all over the web. Just do a Google Image search and you can find them all. All one had to do was lift one of the phots and put it through one of those free “meme” generators.
And the PAC
Make America Awesome certainly wasn’t the first.
See how easy it is to make one? I just made this one, took me less than a minute.
FWIW – It was Donald Trump who contacted GQ to get his then girlfriend in the magazine, even providing his plane as the setting:
The editor of British GQ says Donald Trump was "very keen" to see photos of his then-girlfriend in the magazine back in 2000.
"We were bombarded by requests to shoot Melania," recalls Dylan Jones, editor of the publication since 1999, speaking to The Hollywood Reporter. "And so, given that she was obviously so keen to be featured in GQ, we came up with a rather kitsch and camp story for her to feature in."
Naturally, Trump himself was very interested in the shoot. Although he wasn’t present on the day, he requested that photographs be delivered to his office.
“We framed the cover and a selection of prints and sent them as soon as we could,” says Jones.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/gq-editor-recalls-donald-trump-878336