How Melania Trump forced a Croatia language school to remove its billboards

Ivis Buric, a spokeswoman for the school, American Institute, has apologized. She said the billboards were “misunderstood as something intended to mock the US first lady,” and said they were intended “to show her as a role model.”

Nevertheless, Buric admitted the campaign had proven to be “very successful” because of the wide local and international publicity it had received.

Protecting her image

The first lady has hired a law firm tasked with protecting her image in her native Slovenia, where her face has been used without permission to market items including cakes and ice cream, underwear and even holiday packages.

“I’m satisfied with the fact that the school admitted that they violated the law and that they are ready to remove the billboards and [Facebook] ads,” said Trump’s lawyer, Natasa Pirc-Musar. “We are still analyzing possible further legal steps.”

Cars drive past the empty advertising space from which a billboard depicting the first lady Melania Trump was removed, in Zagreb, Croatia, Tuesday, Sept. 19, 2017. Billboards featuring Melania Trump and the slogan “just imagine how far you can go with a little bit of English” were removed Tuesday from the Croatian capital after her lawyer threatened a lawsuit. (AP Photo/Darko Bandic)

Melania Trump was born in neighboring Slovenia, then part of Yugoslavia, as Melanija Knavs, but left in her 20s to pursue an international modelling career. She met Donald Trump, then a real estate developer and self-proclaimed billionaire, at a New York Fashion Week party in 1998.