President Donald Trump has long claimed he didn’t pay full price for First Lady Melania Trump’s 15-carat diamond engagement ring.
He told The New York Times in 2005 that he got a large discount on the $1.5 million ring. (It’s not quite clear whether $1.5 million was the original price or the claimed discount price.)
At the time, Trump was quoted saying: “Only a fool would say, ‘No thank you, I want to pay a million dollars more for a diamond.'” The anecdote was part of a report on vendors offering up goods for publicity purposes.
But Laurence Graff, chairman of Graff Diamond, says he didn’t provide any discount, the International Business Times reports. Another source said Donald Trump paid for the ring on the spot, according to the news outlet.
In this video you can see Melania Trump showing off her engagement ring at the Met Gala in 2004.
Tobias Kormind of 77Diamonds.com was quoted saying the engagement ring would likely sell for $3 million today.
A few years ago, for their 10th anniversary, Trump gave his wife another ring with a larger diamond. That ring is likely worth $3.5 million, Kormind told Express.
Read more at the International Business Times