Trump named Time's 'Person of the Year'
President-elect Trump has been named Time magazine’s 2024 “Person of the Year.”
The legacy news magazine announced the decision Thursday morning.
In a feature announcing the magazine’s honoree, Time noted that the president-elect is now the “world’s most powerful man.”
“Trump’s political rebirth is unparalleled in American history,” the feature reads. “His first term ended in disgrace, with his attempts to overturn the 2020 election results culminating in the attack on the U.S. Capitol. 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.”
Time added that Trump has “realigned American politics” and remade the Republican Party. The most recent election in which he defeated Vice President Harris, according to the feature, left Democrats “reckoning with what went awry.”
“While Democrats estimated that most of the country wanted a President who would uphold the norms of liberal democracy, Trump saw a nation ready to smash them, tapping into a growing sense that the system was rigged,” the author wrote.
The news outlet noted that as Trump prepares to enter the White House again, he has to contend with everything he campaigned on, including a globalized economy, mass migration and China. He will also inherit a rocky international situation, with wars raging between Ukraine and Russia, and in the Middle East.
Time also highlighted the July assassination attempt against Trump, a moment that he told the magazine “changed” a lot of people.
There are concerns among Democrats about what Trump will do in his second term, without the limitations of reelection and nearly unchecked power thanks to the Supreme Court’s immunity decision. Time argued the election gave him power, but America — and the globe — will have to wait to see how he uses it.
“The election gave Trump political capital to address the sources of American discontent at home and abroad,” the feature’s author wrote. “The question now is how he intends to spend it.”
Trump, 78, also planned to be in New York City early Thursday morning to ring the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange.
Trump was also named Time’s Person of the Year in 2016, when he won his first presidential election. Last year, pop star Taylor Swift was the magazine’s top choice.
Prior honorees include President Biden and Harris in 2020, tech billionaire Elon Musk in 2021 and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in 2022.
Updated at 8:55 a.m. EST