Donald Trump, the Ultimate Millennial

Is Donald Trump the ultimate Millennial? What if Trump is not an anomaly in American politics but the purest expression of a generational cultural shift? Trump is not a Millennial by age, but his political style—personal branding, constant self-projection, and social-media immediacy—often resembles cultural patterns associated with that generation. Just as the Swiss cultural historian Jacob Burckhardt helped shape how we understand the Renaissance today, could a simple reference to “Generation Me” and the Millennials help us understand Trump and the Millennials he has appointed to run the country?

A Generational Context

To understand why Trump’s behavior resonates with a particular segment of Americans, it helps to look through a generational lens that shapes modern cultural attitudes. While it is not always easy for this Baby Boomer to distinguish among Gen X, Gen Y, and Gen Z and the many labels attached to Millennial identities – generally defined as those people born roughly between 1981-1996 – there is no question that Donald Trump shares certain traits with them. Generalizations are risky, but descriptions of Millennials by scholars highlight traits that also appear in Trump’s public persona.

Jean M. Twenge, a professor of psychology at San Diego State University, has written about this generation. In Generation Me, she describes Millennials as having “increased levels of confidence.” In an article for Psychology Today, Twenge also offered reasons why some Millennials reacted positively to Trump during the 2016 U.S. election: “Millennials prize authenticity because they grew up in a culture that focuses more on the self and less on social rules … Donald Trump is just being himself, and he clearly thinks of himself as special.”

In an interview, Twenge elaborated:

So, millennials tend to have very positive views of themselves and are very optimistic about their expectations for their lives and they’re more likely to say that they’re above average compared to their peers and they tend to score higher on other measures of positive self-views, like self-esteem and even narcissism.

But, there’s also some fairly distinct differences in the way they see the world and they tend to, as a very general rule, be more focused on themselves and less focused on things outside themselves compared to the way boomers and gen Xers were at the same age.

So, in one of my favorite recent studies, we look at the Google Books database over time and found that the use of “I,” “me” and “mine” increased while the use of “we” and “us” went down.

Trump as a Mirror of Millennials

If Twenge’s analysis is correct and accurately describes a broad generational pattern, Trump’s politics may represent not just a personality but a cultural style shaped by decades of growing individualism. Even in elections where younger voters leaned Democratic, roughly two out of five Millennials still voted for Trump—suggesting that his political style resonates with a significant minority of that generation.

How else to explain the short video montage posted by the White House on social media in early March 2026, which mixed real footage from U.S. strikes on Iran with clips from movies, video games, and internet memes?

So Trump’s public persona begins to look less erratic and more generational. His relentless self-promotion, unapologetic personal aggrandizement, and frequent dismissal of traditional norms mirror traits frequently associated with the culture of “Generation Me.” Trump’s political communication, particularly through social media, favors immediacy, emotional authenticity, and a direct appeal to followers rather than the measured language of traditional political institutions and diplomacy. In that sense, Trump does not simply appeal to Millennials; he often behaves like one.

Experience and Leadership in Question

Trump’s leadership style may also be reflected in the relatively young political figures he has chosen.A Brookings study found that Cabinet members tend to be over 50, with recent administrations like Biden’s showing average ages near 59 — typical for high‑level roles. In Trump’s first term, the average age of his Cabinet appointees was about 60 years old.

The three top figures in today’s cabinet—J. D. Vance, Marco Rubio, and Pete Hegseth—are unusually young for their positions, with Vance at 40 as Vice President, Rubio at 53 as Secretary of State, and Hegseth around 45 as Secretary of Defense—making them some of the youngest senior officials in modern U.S. administrations, even if they are not the youngest in American history.

In 2017, Senator Bob Corker famously asked: “Are there any adults in the room?” As a Republican strategist commented on Vance: “J.D. Vance is a guy who wrote a book and helped with a Netflix show,” implying his résumé was thin compared to traditional executive experience.

As for Rubio’s handling of foreign policy, during a Senate hearing on May 21, 2025, Senator Chris Van Hollen said directly to Rubio: “I have to tell you directly and personally that I regret voting for you for Secretary of State.” This was part of a broader critique of his decisions and their impact, including cuts to foreign aid and diplomatic direction. Recent criticisms have focused on his being inconsistent and unclear about the United States’ bombing of Iran, with lawmakers warning that his shifting explanations for U.S. military actions undermine confidence in his leadership as Secretary of State.

And the Secretary of Defense? U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth, a combat veteran, said on the Senate floor that Hegseth is “unqualified, unprepared, unethical, and unfit to be Secretary of Defense,” emphasizing the scale and complexity of the role and contrasting that with his background. And this was during his Senate confirmation, well before the kidnapping of President Maduro of Venezuela and the bombing of Iran with all its expansion and uncertainty.

A Millennial Takeover?

Why is no one now asking again: “Where are the adults in the room?” They should be. Are Millennials taking over the presidency and highest levels of government? Whether admired or reviled, Donald Trump may ultimately be less an outlier and more a mirror of the generational attitudes he embodies—and of the Millennials he has chosen to shape the machinery of government alongside him.

Just as John Kennedy’s “New Frontier” embodied the optimism of the postwar generation, one might argue that Trump reflects a later cultural shift toward individualism, self-expression, and distrust of institutions. Trump may ultimately be less a historical anomaly than the political embodiment of an era increasingly defined by the triumph of the self.

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