Time magazine will name Trump as this year’s choice on Thursday, November 12, recognizing the president-elect as the individual or group deemed to have wielded the greatest influence on global affairs “for good or for ill.”
To celebrate the unveiling of the magazine cover, Trump will ring the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange, a source familiar with the matter told CNN. Trump sat for a wide-ranging interview with the magazine last month.
Trump’s 2024 selection comes 8 years after his first recognition in 2016, when Time named him Person of the Year after his unexpected rise to the presidency. This time, the unveiling caps a remarkable comeback and a resurgence that has the potential to upend modern American politics.
Time’s Person of the Year remains an annual cultural touchstone and the distinction has become an obsession of sorts for Trump throughout the years. A Time cover naming him Person of the Year in 2009 hung in several of his golf clubs, The Washington Post reported nearly a decade later, though no such issue was ever printed.
Over time, the title became a symbol of the mainstream fame and respect Trump sought out but appeared out of reach. In 2015, when the magazine named then-German Chancellor Angela Merkel its Person of the Year, he wrote on Twitter, “I told you @TIME Magazine would never pick me as person of the year despite being the big favorite,” before adding: “They picked person who is ruining Germany.”
Even after Time named Trump its person of the year in 2016 – which he called “a great honor” on social media – he continued to closely monitor the results. The following year, Trump claimed he was in the mix for the distinction again but wouldn’t agree to an interview and photo shoot. Time disputed his version of events.