The first-ever mugshot of an American president has been released.
Donald J. Trump’s historic booking photo has been revealed from his surrender at the Fulton County Jail in Atlanta on Thursday.
Trump was charged earlier this month with 13 counts of attempting to interfere with Georgia’s election process in the 2020 presidential race. It marked the fourth indictment of Trump in recent months. All told, Trump faces 91 criminal counts that could result — if convicted on all charges — of a sentence of roughly 700 years in prison.
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Trump managed to avoid a booking photo in his previous indictments. Some have argued that such a photo is unnecessary, as the point of a mugshot is help identify the person being arrested and Trump is one of the world’s most famous figures. Others have countered that Trump’s fame should not afford him any special treatment and that his booking process should be the same as everybody else’s.
“Unless somebody tells me differently, we are following our normal practices, and so it doesn’t matter your status, we’ll have a mugshot ready for you,” Fulton County Sheriff Pat Labat previously told local media.
It’s been speculated that such a mugshot will be quickly weaponized by the Trump campaign to spur fundraising, as Trump has managed to spin his actions that would have shamed and sunk any other politician as unfair persecution. The campaign has previously sold T-shirts with fake mugshot photos, as it was reported over the summer that Trump quietly started diverting more of the money he was raising for his 2024 presidential campaign to a PAC that he’s used to pay his legal fees.
It’s also been speculated that Trump’s mugshot could become one of the most famous photos of all time — perhaps the most seen ever.
When asked about that possibility, Oxford photo historian Geoffrey Batchen told The Hollywood Reporter: “To get an answer you would have to define ‘most seen.’ If you’re talking about ‘in proportion to the world’s population,’ then perhaps the moon landing photograph might win the race? Trump is an American problem; people in other countries are not as obsessed with his foibles as Americans are. I imagine Trump is hoping it will be widely distributed as he aims to cash in on it, as always. I wouldn’t encourage him. If you ignored him, he would go away.”
Given Trump’s four indictments and his lead in the GOP primary polls, the media — or the public — don’t seem likely to ignore the candidate anytime soon. His surrender comes one day after the first Republican primary debate, where eight other candidates struggled to break from the pack. Pundits have suggested the debate was largely won by former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley and tech billionaire Vivek Ramaswamy, though it remains in doubt whether any of the rival candidates can close Trump’s considerable polling gap (no candidate has ever lost a primary with such a large lead at this point).
Fulton County’s District Attorney Fani Willis has reportedly requested an Oct. 23 trial date.
