The release of Donald Trump's mug shot has been referred to as a historic moment, as it marks the first time that a former United States president has had their mug shot taken. Though Trump was not in jail for long, he surrendered at the Fulton County jail in Atlanta on Thursday, August 24, on charges related to interfering with Georgia's election results in 2020. Though a US president has technically been arrested before, this is the first time a former president has posed for a mug shot.
According to Time, Ulysses S. Grant was also arrested (in 1872), meaning that Trump is technically not the first president to have been arrested. Grant was arrested for speeding, but a mug shot was never taken.
“[Trump's mug shot] will be forever part of the iconography of being alive in this time,” Marty Kaplan, a professor at the University of Southern California Annenberg School of Communications, told the Associated Press.
Trump insists that he is innocent.
"They insisted on a mugshot and I agreed to do that," he told Fox News. "This is the only time I’ve ever taken a mugshot. It is not a comfortable feeling — especially when you’ve done nothing wrong."
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Trump is also the first president to earn an inmate number (P01135809), according to The Washington Post. Eighteen codefendants have also been charged in Georgia. Some of them even smiled in their mug shots. Trump's bail was set at $200,000 and he was quickly released. According to jail records, he is 6'3" and weighs 215 pounds. His hair was listed as "Blond or Strawberry."
