What evidence exists regarding Donald Trump's academic records and how credible is each source?
This fact-check may be outdated. Consider refreshing it to get the most current information.
Executive summary
Public reporting shows no publicly released transcript or official grade record for Donald Trump; multiple reputable outlets document that his former lawyer Michael Cohen sent letters warning schools not to disclose records and schools invoked FERPA to refuse requests [1] [2]. Independent archival checks — commencement programs and dean’s lists — show Trump’s name absent from Wharton honor rolls and the 1968 dean’s list, which reporters treat as indirect evidence he did not graduate with honors [3] [4].
1. The headline allegation: threats to block disclosure
Michael Cohen told Congress he directed letters to Fordham, Penn and other institutions threatening legal action if they released Trump’s records; Fordham confirmed such outreach and said it would not reveal records because federal law bars disclosure without the student’s consent [1] [5]. Time, PBS and other outlets reported the same chain: Cohen’s testimony, the May 2015 letter to Fordham and school spokespersons’ statements [2] [1].
2. Why institutions refused: FERPA and normal practice
News reports repeatedly note that the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) prevents universities from releasing student files without consent, meaning schools’ refusals were consistent with federal law rather than proof of wrongdoing [6] [1]. Journalists stress that the legal prohibition makes any public search for transcripts inherently constrained unless Trump waived release [6] [5].
3. Archival absence as circumstantial evidence
Reporters and researchers have compared public archival documents — commencement programs and contemporaneous dean’s lists — and found Trump’s name missing from Wharton honors lists and the Daily Pennsylvanian’s 1968 dean’s list; outlets like Philadelphia magazine and University Herald present those omissions as a “proof by omission” that he did not graduate with honors [3] [7]. Such proofs are indirect: absence from publicly published honor rolls is informative but not the same as an official transcript showing GPA [3].
4. Estimates and inferences about GPA and honors
Analysts have used Wharton’s published thresholds to estimate that graduating without honors implies a GPA under the school’s cutoff (Forbes notes Wharton’s honors cutoff around a 3.40), and reporters argue that this would explain Trump’s eagerness to keep records private [8]. These numeric inferences rely on institutional rules plus the archival absences; they are plausible but not confirmed by a released transcript [8] [3].
5. Source credibility: firsthand testimony vs. secondary inference
Firsthand, contemporaneous sources — Cohen’s sworn congressional testimony and university spokesman statements — are high-value reporting and are corroborated across outlets including Time, PBS and People [2] [1] [5]. Archival searches by journalists (commencement programs, student newspaper dean’s lists) are credible secondary evidence when done transparently; they establish omission but cannot substitute for sealed transcripts [3] [7]. Opinionated or partisan sources (campaign sites or party statements) offer interpretation but not new documentary proof [9] [10].
6. What journalists and fact-checkers say about Trump’s public claims
Reporters note a pattern: Trump has repeatedly boasted about attending Wharton and being a top student, yet concrete support for claims of graduating “top of his class” is missing in the public record; fact-check pieces treat those claims skeptically and point to the dean’s-list omissions and lack of honors as counter-evidence [3] [4]. That discrepancy drives much of the reporting: public boast versus archival silence [2] [3].
7. Limits of available evidence and outstanding questions
No source in the provided set includes an officially released transcript, SAT score sheet, or authenticated GPA; the documents journalists cite are either Cohen’s letters/testimony or published university programs and contemporaneous university newspapers [1] [3]. Available sources do not mention any released Penn or Fordham transcript showing Trump’s grades or GPA.
8. Bottom line for readers assessing credibility
Primary contemporary documentation that schools refused requests and that Cohen sent warnings is well-sourced and corroborated [1] [5] [2]. Archival absences from commencement and dean’s-list publications are persuasive circumstantial evidence that Trump did not graduate with honors but are not definitive proof of exact grades [3] [7]. Claims about precise GPA, SAT scores or disciplinary sanctions rest on inference and remain uncorroborated in the cited reporting [8] [4].