This article marks the first in what I intend to be a recurring series of tier lists – and oh boy, are we starting with a bang! This is the tier list of Trump’s greatest moments – it will be structured in the now-infamous internet tier structure. For those who may not know, this structure is organized as follows; D-A are the equivalent of letter grades, with D being the lowest/worst and A being the highest/best. S is the elite tier – think of this as the ace, the A+, the best of the best. When multiple entries are in the same tier, they are ranked from left to right with the furthest left being the best. Why is S-tier at the top? I don’t know – I don’t make the rules of the internet. A final note before we get into this topic is that all of these are among Trump’s best moments – meaning even D-tier is going to contain some quality stuff. If this tier list were a vinyl album, it would be Trump’s Greatest Hits, so if your favorite moment is in D or C-tier, remember that this entire group is made up of hilarious, awesome, inspirational content. If I forgot any noteworthy moments, write in and let me know – feel free to share this article with your opinion of how these moments ought to be ranked.
D-Tier
Alright, here we go! We are starting off this list with a D-tier entry – Trump’s signature handshake. In a world full of sissy-men like Trudeau, Macron, and Newsom, Trump stands out in many ways as a modern symbol of masculinity. Whether you like it or not, this is a simple fact. Trump’s no-nonsense approach to negotiating (more on that later – see A-tier) is often proceeded by him using his imposing 6ft 3in frame to pull world leaders into a controlled handshake. It truly is such a perfect image of Trump’s general approach. We are America – we are bigger, stronger, and more influential – and you’ll feel it when you deal with us. Are you the driving force behind NATO funding? Is your economy the only thing that holds China back from global control? Do you send your resources to the rest of the world when natural disaster strikes? No, no, and no? OK, right – because that’s what America does – so we’re going to take the lead on this discussion. It’s all conveyed in a handshake – just like my Old Man told me when I was a young boy: you can tell an awful lot about a man the moment you shake his hand. Trump may not keep the best diet – a topic which concerns me for his long term health – but the guy still has some serious old-man strength.
C-Tier
Onward and upward! We have two entries for C-tier. Our first-place entry in this tier is Trump surviving his second assassination – yeah, you heard that right – surviving an active shooter is all the way down in C-tier. That is how epic and impactful some of these moments have been in world history and culture. Like they say, the sequel is rarely as good as the original, and when a second left-wing donor-extremist- nut-job took shots at Trump on a Florida golf course, that saying held true. The shooter – a liberal who had grown to hate Trump and actively call for his death – missed several shots, ran through a small patch of woods, and was eventually apprehended. For any normal person, this would be the story you tell at Thanksgiving for the rest of your days – but for Trump, this is a C-tier entry.
The second-place entry in C-tier is his iconic golden escalator moment. It is not often that you can look back at history, place your finger on a moment, and say, “Here, this is where the historic movement officially and definitively started.” This moment sees Trump and his family members announce that he was very serious about an idea that the rest of the world thought was a joke. Oh, how wrong we all were (yes, I include myself... I did not have any idea what MAGA would become).
B-Tier
Now we’re getting into the fun stuff. So far, we have seen Trump survive an assassination and man-handle world leaders physically, but now we get to see him man-handle world leaders verbally. Our top spot in B-tier is the debate in which Trump ended Joe Biden’s political career and his bid for re-election – specifically, though, I love the moment in which Biden stammers and sputters through a tangled web of garbled nonsense and Trump simply answers, “I really don’t know what he said at the end of that sentence, I don’t think he knows what he said, either.” It was the perfect reply and almost seemed to be more laced with pity than mockery. The mainstream media, the democrat party, and the White House had been actively lying to the US citizenry for years about Joe Biden’s mental health and Trump – having learned from his past encounters – chose to gracefully step back and let Joe be Joe on live TV. Biden’s performance was abysmal. Left-wing operatives who could no longer shield him chose to turn their political swords on him. Kamala was forced into the race without a democratic process. The rest is history.
The second-place for B-tier is Trump’s Twitter-feed in general, but particularly the manner in which he targeted North Korea’s Kim Jung Un by leveraging the social media world of Twitter (now X). Trump labeled Kim as “Rocket Man” and strong-armed the dictator into an historic meeting – which Trump himself attended by daring to enter North Korean territory on his own terms. The media squawked that Trump’s harsh rhetoric would cause WWIII, late-night hosts mocked the “Tweeter-in-Chief”, but in the end, Trump made unheard of progress in extending peaceful relations to North Korea. Ironically, the same mainstream media which said Trump’s rhetoric was dangerously harsh in 2021 now says his rhetoric is too soft in 2025 – all while ignoring that it was Joe Biden, not Donald Trump, who used his presidency to bring us closer to WWIII.
A-Tier
Alright, here are the A-tier moments. These are incidents that stick out in my mind as being so funny, so relatable, so unforgettable, and so influential that I know they will stay in my mind for years to come and each of them likely changed the course of history.
Tied for first place we have the old-school campaigning that helped push Trump over the line in a race that had, for the majority of its existence, been a razor thin toss-up between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump. Then Trump worked at McDonalds and rolled up in a MAGA-themed garbage truck. These moments were the type of self-deprecating, comedic, relatable stuff that your average American looks at and says, “OK, that is awesome.” I don’t care who you are – you can hate Orange Man all you want – you just have to admit that these campaign moves were lightning in a bottle, and they lead to photo-ops which were irresistible in the social media age. The pictures simply had to be shared far and wide and they were useful in internet meme form, as well. I honestly think these two moves either won Trump the presidency or significantly added to his margin of victory.
Next, we have one domestic and two international moments. The domestic moment was when Trump systematically took down notorious RINO Jeb Bush. 2016 was supposed to be the same-old same-old, with a Clinton and a Bush facing off for the presidency – we all knew it and so did Trump. So, he just went on stage and said what we were all thinking: Hey, the people don’t actually want you, Jeb. You’re low-energy and boring and polished and phony. And just like that, boom – no more Jeb Bush (politically speaking, of course). It was refreshing and funny – and it marked a real shift in power.
If the Jeb Bush moments made us all laugh and shook the right awake as if to say, “You do not need to accept the status quo, anymore,” then the next two moments made us all go, “Heck yes!” as the world was shaken awake. Both of these moments involve Trump dealing with radical Islamic terrorists. When seeking to establish a cease fire with the leader of the Taliban, Trump wanted the war-lord to understand how serious the situation had become – so what did he do? Did he give a speech on the White House lawn? Did he shake his fist at the TV cameras? No – he sent the Taliban leader a picture of his own home and said, “Figure it out. If you do anything, we are going to hit you harder than any country has ever been hit.” Like I said – Heck. Yes. I really don’t know what else there is to say on this topic.
Our final, but equally great, entry in A-tier is the time that Trump announced the successful elimination of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi by saying, “He died like a dog, he died like a coward, he was whimpering, screaming, and crying.” I was actively flying a mission that night during a set of Air Force orders and all I can tell you is that in my years of service, I do not think any presidential words were quoted as much as Trump’s speech was on that night. In that moment, Trump spoke like a soldier while praising the efforts of soldiers – it wasn’t the mealy-mouthed political nonsense you’d get from a Bush or an Obama, it was relatable, raw, and dare I say – pretty darn funny.
S-Tier
The best has truly been saved for last – here are the S-tier entries. For this tier, I am going to first discuss the two moments which are tied for the runner-up position. These are: 1) When Trump, in a potentially campaign-ending moment, answered Megyn Kelly’s gotcha question with a quip that was simply beautiful. Kelly, who was at the time something of a center-right, soft-feminist, establishment-minded opposition to Trump, slammed the candidate with a question about calling women fat pigs, dogs, slobs, and disgusting animals. In a similar situation, Jeb Bush may have apologized and spoken about how he had grown personally. Romney may have pointed out that the quotes were out of context and promised to be more careful with his words next time. Not Trump. He leaned into the microphone and said, “Only Rosie O’Donnell” – just three words – and the crowd went wild. What would otherwise have been a boring and forgettable answer at best, or a campaign-ending blunder at worst, became the headline news for the next week and a now infamous moment. It was a thing of beauty.
2) The other moment, which is also from the 2016 campaign, happened at the expense of Trump’s general election debate opponent, Hillary Clinton. Hillary had just finished a rant which focused on her belief that it was a good thing that Trump was not in charge of law and order in the US. Trump waited for her to finished, raised his mic, nodded his head and said, “Because you’d be in jail.” Again, the crowd went wild. It was the epitome of Trump exposing the American belief that Hillary was best described as Crooked Hillary. These two moments are, in my opinion, perfect representations of how and why Trump won the 2016 election.
Last but certainly not least, we have the best moment of the top tier. Several of the moments which we have already addressed have resulted in my laughing so hard that I cried – but only one moment moved me in such a raw and emotional manner that my eyes teared up out of a mixture of joy, patriotism, and hope. I am speaking, of course, of the moment that Trump got shot by a left-wing donor in Butler, PA. Trump was mid-speech and in order to see a graphic display, he turned his head slightly. A moment later, multiple gunshots rang out. One struck Trumps ear, causing him to grab the side of his head before being surrounded by secret service a moment later. If the story ended there, it would be an amazing moment in history – but it doesn’t end there. Trump stood up sporting a bloody ear, made his security detail pause, held his fist in the air and shouted, “Fight! Fight! Fight!” before being escorted away. The reaction of the crowd – and the world watching on live TV – was palpable. The brief seconds in which people saw Trump drop seemed to suck the air out of everyone’s lungs – and when he rose and reassured the crowd, the feeling was electric. Tragically, loss of life and injury occurred on that day in Butler - specifically for a loving father and public servant. But in the face of danger and tragedy, the reactions of our 45th and 47th President will go down in history as the reason he won the White House a second time. Had he been killed, had he looked weak, or had he gotten scared and chosen to exit the race, we would not have the President we have today. On display for all to see was the clear truth: this isn’t a Tweeter-in-Chief. It isn’t a bombastic Orange Man. It isn’t an idiot who bumbled and hated his way to the White House – no. This is the Commander In Chief and Leader of the Free World.
