PIERS MORGAN: Melania Trump is right to protect her son Barron from vile Twitter trolls – but when will she tell her husband to stop making Joe Scarborough’s young kids’ lives hell by falsely tweeting their dad’s a murderer? (13 Pics)

I first met Barron Trump when he was 18 months old, during filming of Celebrity Apprentice in New York back in 2007.

It seemed at the time that he’d lucked out by being born into a wonderfully lavish billionaire lifestyle.

But that was before his dad ran for president - and won.

As someone with three sons, I know how tricky it can sometimes be for my boys to grow up with a high-profile controversial father.

So, I can’t even imagine how hard the past few years must have been for Barron, now 14.

He’s had to contend with his father Donald becoming the most powerful, famous, polarising and divisive man in the world.

And he’s had to deal with his own life being turned upside down as he was forced to swap freedom for the heavily guarded and frenziedly scrutinized goldfish bowl of the White House.

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President Donald Trump, First Lady Melania Trump and son Barron are pictured above together in January

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Yes, it must be cool to be able to invite your friends round to see the Oval Office.

But I suspect it’s not so cool to have your father’s every spit, cough, p*ssy-grabbing tape and porn star fling exposed to the world.

That’s why I have tremendous sympathy for Barron, and fully understand why his mother Melania has fought back so hard against a comedian’s repulsive trolling of him at the weekend.

‘I hope Barron gets to spend today with whoever his dad is,’ tweeted Food Network host John Henson on Sunday, which was Father’s Day.

What a contemptible thing to say, especially given Henson has two young children himself.

When his jibe was met with outrage, Henson pathetically tried to lie his way out the hole.

‘The joke was aimed at Trump,’ he bleated disingenuously, ‘and the mere mention of Barron’s name doesn’t mean it’s at his expense'.

Of course, it does.

Henson, a 54-year-old man, was deliberately mocking a 14-year-old boy in the cruellest way possible – by inferring his father isn’t his father.

Melania was furious, instructing her spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham to issue a statement slamming the ‘inappropriate and insensitive comments’.

Grisham added: ‘As with every other administration, a minor child should be off-limits and allowed to grow up with no judgement or hate from strangers and the media.’

Most right-minded people surely agree.

I know I do.

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Stand-up comedian and Food Network host John Henson tweeted on Sunday, Father's Day: ' I hope Barron gets to spend today with whoever his dad is'

But I would extend that protective shield to the children of numerous other high-profile people who have been targeted with similar judgement and hate thanks to Donald Trump’s Twitter tirades.

Take MSNBC anchor Joe Scarborough’s four kids.

Two of them are just 16 and 12.

What do you think their lives have been like for the past few weeks after the President of the United States publicly accused their father of murdering a young woman?

In a series of appalling tweets last month, Trump repeated entirely false allegations that Scarborough was responsible for the death in 2001 of Lori Klausutis, a staffer who worked for him in a Florida district office in when he was in Congress.

She died after falling in Scarborough’s office and hitting her head on his desk.

Police thoroughly investigated her death at the time and found no signs of foul play.

The coroner concluded unequivocally that she had an undiagnosed heart problem that caused her to fall.

So, she wasn’t murdered.

She died, tragically early at just 28 years old, from natural causes.

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Scarborough is pictured above with his daughter Katherine in an Instagram photo

And Joe Scarborough was proven to be 800 miles away at the time, in Washington DC.

But this hasn’t stopped President Trump pursuing a vile campaign of disinformation to attack Scarborough who has been very critical of his presidency.

On May 4, Trump wrote: “Concast” should open up a long overdue Florida Cold Case against Psycho Joe Scarborough.’

On May 12 he expanded on this appeal: ‘'When will they open a Cold Case on the Psycho Joe Scarborough matter in Florida. Did he get away with murder? Some people think so. Why did he leave Congress so quietly and quickly? Isn't it obvious? What's happening now? A total nut job!'

On May 23, Trump tweeted again: ‘A blow to her head? Body found under his desk? Congress suddenly? Big topic of discussion in Florida.. and he’s a Nut Job (with bad ratings). Keep digging, use forensic geniuses!’

The next day, he said: ‘So a young marathon runner just happened to faint in his office, hit her head on his desk, & die? I would think there is a lot more to this story than that? An affair? What about the so-called investigator?’

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President Trump has continued to attack Scarborough on Twitter. Scarborough (seen above) has been very critical of his presidency

On May 26, Trump returned to the subject: ‘The opening of a Cold Case against Psycho Joe Scarborough was not a Donald Trump original thought, this has been going on for years, long before I joined the chorus. In 2016 when Joe & his wacky future ex-wife, Mika, would endlessly interview me, I would always be thinking about whether or not Joe could have done such a horrible thing? Maybe or maybe not, but I find Joe to be a total Nut Job, and I knew him well, far better than most. So many unanswered & obvious questions, but I won’t bring them up now! Law enforcement eventually will?'

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Lori Klausutis died at age 28 in 2001. She had an undiagnosed heart condition and fell and hit her head at work 

That same day, Trump doubled down during a press conference in White House Rose Garden when the media pressed him on whether he thought Scarborough murdered Klausutis, saying: ‘A lot of people suggest that. Hopefully someday people are going to find out. It’s certainly a very suspicious situation. Very sad, very sad and very suspicious.’

A reporter then asked Trump if he had seen the letter written by Klausutis' widower Timothy, which begged Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to remove the president's tweets because they were hurtful to the late aide's family members.

Mr Klausutis said: ‘I have mourned my wife every day since her passing. I have tried to honor her memory and our marriage. As her husband, I feel that one of my marital obligations is to protect her memory as I would have protected her in life. There has been a constant barrage of falsehoods, half-truths, innuendo and conspiracy theories since the day she died. I realize that may sound like an exaggeration, unfortunately it is the verifiable truth. Because of this, I have struggled to move forward with my life.’

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President Trump has continued to tweet about Lori Klausutis' death suggesting that Joe Scarborough may have been behind her death 

But even this utterly heart-breaking plea didn’t stop Trump.

'Yeah, I have,' he replied, about seeing the letter, 'but I'm sure ultimately they want to get to the bottom of it and it's a very serious situation. As you know, there’s no statute of limitations. So, it would be a very good, very good thing to do.’

The truth is that there is nothing to get to the bottom of, and Trump knows it.

For the world’s most powerful man to fuel such a disgusting pack of lies just to hit back at a critical TV host is of course unbelievably hurtful to the Klautusis family.

But it must also be unbelievably hurtful to Scarborough’s own young children.

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Speaking via her spokesperson, the First Lady said all minors in the White House should be allowed to grow up with no 'judgment or hate from strangers'. They are pictured walking to Air Force One at Morristown Municipal Airport in New Jersey on August 18, 2019

They have to go to school with other kids thinking their dad’s a murderer, because the President keeps using his massive platform to suggest he is.

I would think they’ve been getting all manner of ‘judgement’ and ‘hate’ including from strangers on social media.

It’s a despicable abuse of presidential power, and to date, Melania Trump has said nothing about it.

So yes, the First Lady is right about the need to protect her son from nasty Twitter trolls.

But I would respect Melania a lot more if she publicly told her husband, the world’s most notorious Twitter troll, to lay off making Joe Scarborough’s kids’ lives hell too with his shameful lies.

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