Meghan Markle and Donald Trump Are Facing Off for the First (and Probably Last) Time

Isabel Jones
Updated

[MUSIC] [MUSIC] Harry and Meghan have allegedly been contemplating traveling to Mexico to meet her dad. Perhaps if he gave fewer interviews, that royal trip would happen sooner, rather than later.

For the first (and probably last) time, Meghan Markle and Donald Trump are facing off. No, the Duchess of Sussex is not running for president, nor is The Donald wooing Prince Harry. Instead, both parties are in contention for an honor of sorts (depending on who you ask): Time’s 2018 Person of the Year.

The ultimate Person of the Year (a title that’s determined by who’s “had the biggest impact on the world, for better or for worse”) will be one of the ten figures named to Time’s shortlist on Monday morning. As exclusively revealed by Today, the candidates are as follows:

1. President Donald Trump

2. Separated Families

3. Vladimir Putin

4. Robert Mueller

5. Ryan Coogler

6. Christine Blasey Ford

7. Jamal Khashoggi

8. March for Our Lives Activists

9. Moon Jae-in

10. Meghan Markle

Trump was Time’s Person of the Year in 2016, and Putin wore the title in 2007. Last year’s honor was bestowed upon the women who contributed to the Time’s Up and #MeToo movements, the so-termed “Silence Breakers.” The now-iconic cover featured Ashley Judd, Taylor Swift, strawberry picker Isabel Pascual, lobbyist Adama Iwu, software engineer Susan Fowler, and the elbow of a hospital worker who chose to remain anonymous (and therein represented the multitudes of women unable to come forward publicly).

RELATED: Why One Woman Was Cropped Out of Time's Person of the Year Cover

Though it may seem strange that Trump and Putin are both in the running despite already having been named Person of the Year, there is a president — er, precedent … Barack Obama earned the title in both 2008 and 2012, and George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004 — and they aren’t the only ones. Franklin D. Roosevelt, Joseph Stalin, George Marshall, Harry Truman, Winston Churchill, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Lyndon B. Johnson, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Deng Xiaoping, Mikhail Gorbachev, Bill Clinton, and The American Soldier all wore the title more than once as well.

Time’s 2018 Person of the Year will be revealed on Today Tuesday morning.