President-elect Donald Trump was named Time's Person of the Year for 2024, marking the second time he was bestowed with the designation.
His son Donald Trump Jr. revealed on Wednesday that his dad would be this year's Person of the Year.
Posted on X on Wednesday, Trump Jr. said, "Trump wins Time Person of The Year and Chris Wray announces he’s out of the FBI on the same day," and added, "Are you sick of all the winning yet?"
Time said that Trump participated in a 30-minute photo shoot followed by a 65-minute interview ahead of Thursday's announcement.
2024 marks the seventh consecutive time the winner of the presidential election also was named Person of the Year. Trump was named Person of the Year in 2016 after his win in that year's election. Since Jimmy Carter, every president has been Person of the Year at least once. Gerald Ford was the last U.S. president to never be named Person of the Year.
One paragraph encapsulates why Trump was this year's winner.
"Trump’s political rebirth is unparalleled in American history. His first term ended in disgrace, with his attempts to overturn the 2020 election results culminating in the attack on the U.S. Capitol," Time wrote. "He was shunned by most party officials when he announced his candidacy in late 2022 amid multiple criminal investigations. Little more than a year later, Trump cleared the Republican field, clinching one of the fastest contested presidential primaries in history. He spent six weeks during the general election in a New York City courtroom, the first former President to be convicted of a crime—a fact that did little to dampen his support. An assassin’s bullet missed his skull by less than an inch at a rally in Butler, Pa., in July. Over the next four months, he beat not one but two Democratic opponents, swept all seven swing states, and became the first Republican to win the popular vote in 20 years. He has realigned American politics, remaking the GOP and leaving Democrats reckoning with what went awry."
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The 2023 winner was pop musician Taylor Swift.
Earlier this week, Time announced the shortlist of finalists. The list includes Kamala Harris, Kate Middleton, Elon Musk, Yulia Navalnaya, Benjamin Netanyahu, Jerome Powell, Joe Rogan, Claudia Sheinbaum and Mark Zuckerberg.
Trump was a finalist for the designation in 2015, 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020.
"Since 1927, TIME has named a person, group, or concept that had the biggest impact—for good or for ill—on the world over the previous 12 months," Time said.
While the designation has generally been seen as an honor, many controversial figures have been named Person of the Year, including Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin and Vladimir Putin.
