Xavier Bettel and Gauthier Destenay became partners in 2010 and officially got married in 2015 when Luxembourg allowed same-sex marriage.
Former President Donald Trump has often met with many male leaders from different countries, while Former First Lady Melania Trump usually socialized with their wives. However, on Thursday, Mrs. Trump got to know the First Gentleman of Luxembourg.
Gauthier Destenay, the husband of Luxembourg’s Former Prime Minister Xavier Bettel, joined Trump and other spouses for dinner while their partners attended a meeting as part of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) conference in Brussels, Belgium.
Former Prime Minister Bettel, aged 51, and Belgian architect Destenay entered into a civil partnership in 2010 and officially married in 2015 after Luxembourg’s lawmakers approved same-sex marriage. Bettel made history by becoming the first openly gay Prime Minister of Luxembourg in December 2013. His sexuality was openly acknowledged during his election campaign but didn’t become a significant issue.
Bettel is currently the only openly gay head of government worldwide, following the end of the tenures of Iceland’s former Prime Minister Johanna Sigurðardóttir, who is a lesbian, and Belgium’s Elio Di Rupo in 2013 and 2015, respectively.
“I have just one life, and I don’t want to hide my life,” Bettel previously said in an interview. “But I was not the ‘gay candidate.’ People didn’t vote for me because I’m gay or I’m straight.”
In April 2017, Bettel and Destenay upset some conservative members of the Catholic Church when Pope Francis invited them to Rome to mark the 60th anniversary of the Treaty Of Rome, which founded the European Union. However, some viewed the visit as a significant statement about the Vatican’s stance on gay rights.