Where did the height and weight on Trump’s booking record come from?
The president’s height was listed at 6-foot-3 and his weight at 215. But based on some of his co-defendants, the numbers may not be accurate.
But based on the booking records for his co-defendants that have already emerged this week, the numbers may not be reliable — and it’s unclear where they came from.
A sprawling indictment unsealed on Aug. 14 charged Trump and 18 co-defendants with participating in a vast criminal enterprise to illegally reverse his defeat in the 2020 presidential election in Georgia. Since that day, others charged in the case have been negotiating bond deals and trickling into Atlanta to surrender for a mug shot, fingerprinting and processing at the county jail.
And while the booking records of those co-defendants list each person’s height, weight, race and hair and eye color, it’s clear that many of the statistics were wrong. What’s not clear is where officials with the Fulton County Sheriff’s Office got them.
David Shafer, for instance, the former state GOP chairman who was charged in connection with his role organizing the meeting of an alternate slate of presidential electors, is listed on his booking record as standing 5-foot-5, weighing 150 pounds with black hair and blue eyes. Public appearances show Shafer to be taller and more heavyset than that, and with gray hair and brown eyes.
Another alternate elector charged in the case, Cathy Latham, is listed with blonde or strawberry blonde hair. Latham’s hair is gray.
Jeffrey Clark was listed as standing 5-foot-3. But two former Justice Department colleagues who requested anonymity to discuss a sensitive topic said they recall him being of average male height.
Trump’s hair color was described as “blond or strawberry” and his eye color was listed as blue.
In the case of former Trump personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, who surrendered on Wednesday, jail records initially listed him at 5-foot-9 and 180 pounds. But later the same day the numbers had changed without explanation to 5-foot-11 and 230 pounds. An individual who accompanied Giuliani to his booking, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive subject, said they did not recall anyone asking the former New York mayor for his height or weight, nor do they recall him being asked to step on a scale.
In addition, the mug shots released so far do not include a yardstick on the wall behind each defendant that would show how tall they stand, as is common in some jurisdictions.
One individual familiar with the booking of a co-defendant in the case said the person’s fingerprints and irises were scanned electronically. But the individual said the sheriff’s staff did not ask for the defendant’s height or weight, nor was the person asked to step on a scale. Those numbers did appear on that person’s booking record, but they didn’t match the person’s profile, or their driver’s license, and the individual has no idea where they came from.
The Fulton County Sheriff’s Office did not respond to a request for comment on the source of the numbers. Bill Hallsworth, the director of jail and court services for the Georgia Sheriffs’ Association, said each county processes defendants differently and he is not familiar with Fulton’s practices. Some counties take the information from driver’s licenses, which can be outdated, he said.
“I know in some of the larger jails, the person doing the data entry is not even looking at the individual,” he said. “They’re getting the info off of something else and entering it into the computer.”
A Trump spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Part of the interest in Trump’s weight and height stems from his own sensitivity about both statistics. He said in 2016 that he was 6-foot-3 and 236 pounds, which the medical community considers overweight; if he were 6-foot-2, as listed on his New York driver’s license, he would be considered obese. At the time, Trump acknowledged that he needed to lose 15 to 20 pounds.
In January 2018, a White House physician claimed he was 6-foot-3 and 239 pounds, a number that many online commentators noted put his body mass index at 29.9 — just below the 30.0 threshold for medical obesity.
At the time, numerous comparisons with other people suggested the numbers were not accurate, though most of the contrasts were with athletes with more muscle than Trump.
Perhaps because of those contrasts, anticipation for the release of the statistics has been mounting since the indictment landed.
The Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump Republican political committee, launched a contest last week offering a free mug to anyone who accurately guessed Trump’s weight. BetOnline, an online wagering site, published odds on whether Trump’s weight is over or under 278 pounds.
“There is no way that Trump is not over three bills,” BetOnline writer Adam Greene offered. “None. This is the easiest money you will ever make on a wager and I would literally bet my house on it.”
Jacqueline Alemany and Ben Brasch contributed to this report.
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