Donald Trump

Quick facts

• Born: June 14, 1946, Queens, New York
• Education: Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania (transferred in; grades sealed)
• Known for: Real-estate developer, host of NBC’s The Apprentice (2004–2015), 45th and 47th President of the United States
• Inheritance: Roughly $413 million (inflation-adjusted) received from his father Fred Trump’s business empire over his lifetime, per a 2018 New York Times investigation
• Business bankruptcies: 6 corporate Chapter 11 filings (Trump Taj Mahal, 1991; Trump Plaza Hotel, 1992; Trump Castle, 1992; Trump Plaza Associates, 1992; Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts, 2004; Trump Entertainment Resorts, 2009)
• Impeachments: 2 — Ukraine aid (2019) and the January 6 insurrection (2021); acquitted by the Senate both times
• Criminal indictments: 4 (Manhattan, federal classified-documents, Georgia RICO, federal January 6)
• Convictions: 34 felony counts in the Manhattan hush-money case (May 2024) — the first U.S. president convicted of a crime
• Family: Son of Queens developer Fred Trump; three marriages; five children (Donald Jr., Ivanka, Eric, Tiffany, Barron)

Key positions

Biography

Donald John Trump was born June 14, 1946, in Queens, New York, and entered the family real-estate business run by his father, Fred Trump. A 2018 New York Times investigation found that the elder Trump funneled roughly $413 million (inflation-adjusted) to his son over his lifetime through some 295 income streams — a finding that complicates Trump’s long-standing “self-made” framing. Trump studied at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania after transferring from Fordham.

In 1973, when Trump was 27, the U.S. Justice Department sued Trump Management for racial discrimination, citing evidence that rental agents marked the applications of Black prospective tenants. The case introduced Trump to attorney Roy Cohn — former counsel to Senator Joseph McCarthy — who countersued the government for $100 million and coached Trump in a never-admit-fault, always-attack posture that journalists and Trump’s own associates have repeatedly identified as formative. The suit was settled in 1975 via a consent decree with no admission of wrongdoing; in 1978 the DOJ returned, alleging Trump had violated its terms. Trump’s later record includes his 1989 full-page newspaper ads calling for the death penalty in the Central Park Five case — defendants who were later exonerated — and a 1991 New Jersey Casino Control Commission fine over discriminatory practices at Trump Plaza.

Trump’s Atlantic City casino era ended in serial bankruptcies; after the 1990 Taj Mahal opening, the company’s collapse left hundreds of contractors owed millions. Largely frozen out of mainstream U.S. lending by the 2000s, Trump rebuilt his public profile as the infallible executive of NBC’s The Apprentice (2004–2015) — a persona producers including Bill Pruitt (speaking after his NDA expired in 2024) later described as a television construction. Reporting by The Washington Post and PBS NewsHour documents a yearslong social relationship between Trump and financier Jeffrey Epstein that, by multiple accounts, ruptured around 2004 amid a dispute over a Palm Beach mansion.

Trump won the presidency in 2016 and served as the 45th president (2017–2021). He was impeached twice — over the withholding of military aid to Ukraine (2019) and over the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol — and acquitted by the Senate each time. After leaving office he faced four criminal indictments across two federal and two state jurisdictions; in May 2024 a Manhattan jury convicted him on 34 felony counts in the hush-money case, making him the first U.S. president convicted of a crime. He returned to office as the 47th president in 2025.

Sources

• United States v. Fred C. Trump, Donald Trump, and Trump Management, Inc. — Civil Rights Litigation Clearinghouse (case 15342; 1975 Consent Order, doc 83283). https://clearinghouse.net/case/15342/
• “Inside the Government’s Racial Bias Case Against Donald Trump’s Company” — New York Times, August 27, 2016. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/28/us/politics/donald-trump-housing-race.html
• “How Donald Trump Developed His Political Playbook” (Roy Cohn) — PBS Frontline, September 24, 2019. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/donald-trump-roy-cohn-race-discrimination-lawsuit-fight-documentary-excerpt/
• “President Trump Played a Key Role in the Central Park Five Case” — Time, June 12, 2019. https://time.com/5597843/central-park-five-trump-history/
• “Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein partied together. Then an oceanfront Palm Beach mansion came between them.” — The Washington Post, July 31, 2019. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/donald-trump-and-jeffrey-epstein-partied-together-then-an-oceanfront-palm-beach-mansion-came-between-them/2019/07/31/79f1d98c-aca0-11e9-a0c9-6d2d7818f3da_story.html
• “Trump Engaged in Suspect Tax Schemes as He Reaped Riches From His Father” ($413M inheritance finding) — New York Times investigation, 2018.