Photo of Barron Trump on Melania's lap leaked

This month, a photo surfaced on Reddit that actually shows Barron Trump sitting on his mother Melania Trump's lap and taking a photo of her.

As is known, in mid-August, a Reddit user posted a photo purporting to show young Barron Trump, the youngest son of 2024 Republican presidential candidate and former President Donald Trump and former First Lady Melania Trump, sitting on his mother's lap in a palatial room while a photograph is taken of her (archived).

The image also appeared on social media in late March 2024 when it was posted on X (archived). Some X users have questioned the optics of the picture because Melania's hands were on Barron's legs and he was sitting on her thighs. Others asked if the picture was real or generated with artificial intelligence.

Another X user even stated that it was fake.

However, the image was real and was found in the Getty Images library.

The picture was taken in early January 2016 – when Barron was 9 years old – during a photo shoot at Trump Tower in New York City and was attributed to Regine Mahaux, according to the Getty caption: