But his commentary on their looks was in keeping with a long-running tendency by Mr. Trump. He has attacked women who criticize him as having faces “like a dog.” He has denied accusations of unwanted sexual advances toward women by telling people to “look at her.”
He has also denigrated the physical appearance of female political rivals. “Look at that face!” he said of Carly Fiorina, one of his Republican primary opponents, to a Rolling Stone reporter aboard his private plane in 2015.
During the campaign, Mr. Trump retweeted a post from someone who had made a side-by-side comparison of Melania Trump, who is a former model, and Heidi Cruz, the wife of his main opponent at the time, Senator Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas.
“A picture is worth a thousand words,” said the tweet that Mr. Trump elevated.
He never apologized for the retweet, but later told Maureen Dowd, an Op-Ed columnist for The New York Times, that it was a mistake to have sent it.