Melania Trump visits Holocaust Memorial Museum

First lady Melania Trump visited the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., on Thursday ahead of International Holocaust Remembrance Day on Saturday.

Trump received a tour of the museum and participated in a moment of silence at the eternal flame in the Hall of Remembrance.

She also lit a candle at the museum’s prayer wall. 

“My thoughts and prayers are with the people whose lives and families were broken by the horrors of the Holocaust,” Trump said in a statement. 

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“Yet it is also through our shared humanity that we come together now in commemoration, strength, and love. My heart is with you, and we remember,” she continued.

Roughly 6 million European Jews were murdered by Nazi Germany during the Holocaust.

Holocaust Remembrance Day falls on the one-year anniversary of President Trump’s first travel ban, an executive order that various Jewish groups criticized.

The order aimed to block people from Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Libya, Sudan and Somalia from entering the U.S. for 90 days and temporarily halt the U.S. refugee resettlement program for 120 days, while indefinitely suspending resettlement for refugees from Syria.

The ban has faced a slew of legal challenges over the past year. 

A number of Jewish groups slammed the ban, saying it invoked images of Jewish refugees being turned away from the U.S. during World War II.

“Most ultimately perished in the Holocaust. That episode remains a blot on the conscience of the United States. It is a terrible irony that today, the same day on which this order is to be signed, is also International Holocaust Remembrance Day,” J Street, a progressive Jewish organization, said in a statement a year ago.