Melania Trump's return to the public spotlight has brought attention to her evolution as the wife of two-term president Donald Trump.

In a resurfaced 1999 interview with ABC News, Daily Mail reports, Melania Knauss made it clear she would not allow others to portray her as a stereotypical gold digger when asked about her reasons for marrying a significantly older rich man.

She also insisted she would stand by her husband if he ever became the U.S. president - a vow she would keep as she stood by President Trump on a long and tumultuous political journey.

Melania dismisses money talk

At the time, the 26-year-old Slovenia native faced gossip that she was principally motivated by material gain when she agreed to marry then-53-year-old billionaire Donald Trump.

"You know, the people, they don't know me," Melania, now 54, told ABC, adding: "People who talk like this, they don't know me."

When interviewer Don Dahler interjected, "Well, you don't see many 26-year-old supermodels on the arm of a 53-year-old car mechanics," Melania pushed back.

"You know what, you can't sleep or to hug or to talk with beautiful things, with beautiful apartment, beautiful plane, beautiful cars, beautiful houses, you can't do that. You could feel very empty."

"And if somebody said, 'you're with the man because he's rich and famous,' they don't know me," she added.

Standing by Donald

Melania also spoke about the possibility of becoming the wife of a U.S. president in the future.

"Yes, I would be very traditional like Jackie Kennedy. I will support him, I will do a lot of social obligations," she said.

When asked if she would sacrifice her modeling career for her political role, Melania replied, "yes," and added, "I would stand by [my] man."

Melania did not know, at the time, just how much her commitment to Donald would be tested in the coming years. She indeed sacrificed her modeling career after her husband's entry into politics made them both pariahs in their longtime residence of New York, one of the fashion capitals of the world.

Over the past year, Melania stood by her husband through two assassination attempts and multiple partisan prosecutions as he fought to pull off the greatest comeback in U.S. political history.

While she once forecasted a "traditional" role as First Lady, Melania has signaled she will return to the role on her own terms, sharing a business-like White House portrait that one could call anything but conventional.

The black-and-white picture shows Melania in a power pose and business suit, setting a serious tone for her second tenure as First Lady.