Donald Trump has
been named Time ‘Person of the Year.’
The President-elect
was declared the latest winner of the annual honor
on TodayWednesday morning, beating out finalists including
Hillary Clinton, Beyonce and Vladmir Putin.
This was the second
year in a row that Trump had been a finalist of the accolade. Hillary Clinton came in second and Hackers came in
third.
‘To be on the cover
of Time as Person of the Year is a tremendous honor,’ said Trump.
Time editor-in-chief
Nancy Gibbs said it was the easiest decision the magazine has ever made for the
honor.
In his interview
with the magazine, Trump compared his leadership style to that of New England
Patriots head coach Bill Belichick and said of illegal immigrants: ‘They’re
killing and raping everybody out there. They’re illegal. And they are finished.’
‘I don’t think
there’s one way of leading people. I think if you talk – and I mention him
because he was so great to me – but if you mention, like, a great leader is a
Coach Belichick. I guarantee you he deals with different people in a different
way,’ said Trump during his interview with Time.
‘He’ll deal with Tom
Brady differently than he’s going to deal with some rookie that just came in,
and they don’t know whether or not he’s going to make it. It’s a different form
of leadership.’
Belichick is a
supporter of Trump, and the Patriots are one of the greatest teams in the
history of football.
Trump also said in
the interview that he does not believe Russia ‘interfered’ and was behind the
wave of hacks over the past few months including the DNC emails.
He then took things
a step further and said that assessment was politically motivated, noting:
‘They tried to build up my relationship with Russia.’
And when asked about
illegal voting during the election, Trump said: ‘I’ve seen many, many
complaints. Tremendous numbers of complaints.’
The President-elect
made it clear as well that he was not backing off his plan to build a wall
between American and Mexico.
‘We’re going to
build the wall. I’m going to build the wall. We’re going to have strong
borders. But we’re also going to have people coming across the borders because
we need workers,’ said Trump.
‘We have to be able
to have people come in to our country, because that’s good for all of us. It’s
good for them, but it’s good for all of us. But we’re going to have very strong
borders.
‘We’re not going to
have illegals coming in. But we’re going to have people coming in, but we’re
also going to have them coming in based to a certain extent on merit.’
He said that he did
still want to welcome in young Dreamers however despite the wall.
‘On a humanitarian
basis it’s a very tough situation,’ said Trump.
‘We’re going to work
something out that’s going to make people happy and proud. But that’s a very
tough situation.’
Trump spoke during
the interview about how he would measure his success as a president as well,
saying: ‘I think we’re going to have a lot of jobs brought back. I think we’re
going to have a lot fewer companies leaving our country.
‘I believe we will
be successful with defeating ISIS or bringing them down to a level where it’s
almost the same thing. And I hope I’m judged from the time of the election, as
opposed to from January 20th, because the stock market has had a tremendous
bounce.
‘And people are
seeing very good things for business in this country. So I think we’re going to
have a lot of victories.’
When then asked what
he thought of this country, Trump said: ‘Most incredible place ever. And we were
losing that. And I don’t want to lose that. And the people that voted for me,
we call them the forgotten men and women.
‘These are great
people, these are people that built this country, and they’ve been forgotten.
They’re people that work hard, that they’re people that love the country. And
they didn’t like what was happening.’
Trump’s extreme
wealth also came up during the interview, with the billionaire businessman
being questioned about how he could understand the middle and working class
given his own opulent lifestyle.
‘I’m sitting in an
apartment the likes of which nobody’s ever seen. And yet I represent the
workers of the world. And they love me and I love them,’ said Trump.
‘But when I was in
Brooklyn I worked for my father on construction sites where he built houses or
what he built, a building in Brooklyn. And I got to understand the construction
workers and the police. These are great people. These are the people that built
the country.’
He later added: ‘I
think people aspire to do things. And they aspire to watch people. I don’t
think they want to see the president carrying his luggage out of Air Force One.
And that’s pretty much the way it is.’
When asked on Tooday
if he saw the honor as a condemnation given how divided the country has become
and the fact that the Time subhead reads ‘President of the Divided States of
America,’ Trump said: ‘Well I think putting divided is snarky. But again it’s
divided, I’m not president yet. I didn’t do anything to divide.’
He then added:
‘There’s a lot of division. We’re going to put it back together.’
Trump actually let
it leak a bit early that he had won the honor, with Today promoting the fact
that they would be speaking with the winner at 7:30am on Wednesday morning.
Trump tweeted 15
minutes prior: ‘I will be interviewed on the @TODAYshow at 7:30. Enjoy!’
When later asked
about his tweeting, Trump said: ‘It’s a modern-day form of communication.’
He also used that
interview to praise President Obama and talk about their newfound friendship.
Time revealed on
Monday that Prime Minister Modi was the winner of the online reader’s poll for
the ‘Person of the Year’ honor.
He won 18 percent of
the vote, finishing well ahead of the other finalists.
There was a
three-way tie for second place, with Trump, President Barack Obama and Julian
Assange all finished with 7 percent of the vote.
Trump was beat
out last year by German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
He responded to the
magazine’s decision at the time by writing on on Twitter: ‘I told you @TIME
Magazine would never pick me as person of the year despite being the big
favorite. They picked person who is ruining Germany.’
The 2015 finalists
included Caitlyn Jenner, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, the Black Lives
Matter protest movement and Uber CEO Travis Kalanick.
Trump finished in
third behind Merkel and ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who was the runner-up
for the 2015 honor.
(Source: DAILY MAIL)
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