Aug. 21 (UPI) — President Donald Trump held a funeral service for his younger brother, Robert Trump, on Friday at the White House.
The younger Trump died Saturday at a New York City hospital at the age of 71. Though his cause of death wasn’t revealed, Robert Trump had been ill and hospitalized earlier in the summer.
Robert Trump’s casket left from the White House in a hearse Friday evening as President Trump, first lady Melania Trump and several family members observed. Bagpipes played the hymn “Abide With Me.”
The president told reporters Monday about his plans to hold the service at the White House.
“That would be, I think, a great honor to him,” he said. “I think he’d be greatly honored. He loved our country, he loved our country so much, he was so proud.”
Robert Trump, who was three years younger than the president, worked in corporate finance on Wall Street and later joined the Trump Organization as a top executive, managing real estate holdings.
He lived in Millbrook, N.Y.
Donald Trump wrote about his brother in 1987 in his book, The Art of the Deal.
“I think it must be hard to have me for a brother but he’s never said anything about it and we’re very close. Robert gets along with almost everyone, which is great for me since I sometimes have to be the bad guy.”
Robert Trump filed an unsuccessful temporary restraining order seeking to block the publication of a book by Mary Trump, the daughter of Fred Trump Jr., the older brother of the president who died in 1981.
Robert and Donald Trump said the book was in violation of a non-disclosure agreement she signed as part of a financial settlement she received from the Trump family.
The book included details about the the Trump family, including the president’s childhood and upbringing.
Robert Trump is survived by two older sisters, Maryanne Barry, a retired federal judge, and Elizabeth Trump Grau, a former executive for Chase Manhattan Bank.
Allen Cone contributed to this report.
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