Trump's 2.94 GPA
Executive summary
A precise official undergraduate GPA for Donald J. Trump is not publicly available because universities cannot disclose transcripts without the student's consent and Trump has long resisted release of his records, including reportedly instructing aides to threaten schools and testing agencies to keep them sealed [1] [2]. Multiple contemporaneous Penn records and classmates contradict Trump's public boasting that he graduated at or near the top of his Wharton class, and independent reporting and some biographers have placed his GPA in the high-2.0s—commonly cited as roughly 2.9—but that figure remains unverified by an official transcript [3] [4] [5].
1. How the public claim arose and what contemporaneous Penn records show
The claim that Trump graduated near the top of his Wharton class appears in an old New York Times profile and has been repeated by Trump himself, but contemporaneous University of Pennsylvania sources compiled by the student newspaper and by Philly Mag show he did not appear on the Wharton commencement honors lists or the 1968 Dean’s List, undermining the “top of class” assertion [1] [3]. The Daily Pennsylvanian published the list of 56 Wharton students on the Dean’s List for 1968 and Trump’s name is absent, a gap classmates have said would not exist if he had been a top student [3] [4].
2. Where the “around 2.9” number comes from and its limits
The oft-cited 2.9 (or similar high‑2.0s figures) originates in reporting by biographers and subsequent secondary outlets that parsed anecdotal memories of classmates and faculty as well as the absence from honors rolls; sources such as Michael D’Antonio and later summaries have noted an approximate 2.9 GPA but acknowledge the lack of an official transcript to confirm it [5] [6]. Those reconstructions are plausible given the available documentary omissions, but they are reconstructions—not primary evidence—and must be treated as informed estimates rather than definitive fact [1] [4].
3. Why an exact GPA has been so hard to confirm—legal and political maneuvers
Universities are legally barred from releasing student transcripts without consent, and reporting from Forbes documents that Michael Cohen testified to sending letters at Trump’s direction threatening schools and the College Board with legal action if they disclosed his grades or SAT scores, which helps explain why definitive records were never released publicly [2]. Philly Mag and other outlets describe this “proof by omission” problem: absence from honors lists is evidence of not graduating with distinction but cannot produce a numeric GPA without a transcript [1].
4. Contrasting perspectives: classmates, professors and the narrative stakes
Several former professors and classmates quoted in archival reporting offered starkly negative impressions of Trump’s academic engagement—one long-tenured professor is quoted as calling him the “dumbest” student the professor had—while other contemporaries described him as “decent” or focused enough to graduate; these conflicting personal recollections feed both the estimate that his GPA was middling and Trump’s motivation to promote a counter-narrative of academic excellence [6] [7]. Reporting outlets such as the Daily Pennsylvanian and Essence emphasize documentary omissions, while partisan or sympathetic accounts sometimes repeat higher self-reported claims, underscoring how the issue functions as a reputational wedge [3] [4].
5. Bottom line: what can and cannot be said with confidence
It cannot be said with absolute certainty that Donald Trump’s undergraduate GPA was exactly 2.94 because no official transcript has been produced for public scrutiny and the University of Pennsylvania has not released his grades; however, independent contemporaneous records and multiple investigative accounts make a top‑of‑class claim implausible and support estimates placing his GPA in the high‑2.0s [1] [3] [5]. Reporters and historians rely on the absence from honors lists, classmates’ memories, and biographer reconstructions to justify the ~2.9 figure, but anyone seeking a definitive numeric GPA would need access to an official transcript not available in the public record [1] [2].