A Timeline Of Donald Trump's Volatile Hair Transformation

This article includes references to sexual assault.

Many of Donald Trump’s detractors aren’t nearly as concerned about the fragile, feathery mass perched atop his skull as they are about what is going on inside the brain beneath it, but plenty of people do care about the president’s hair. For decades, journalists have exhausted themselves trying to describe the appearance of Trump’s signature hairstyle, which wasn’t always the consistency of a bobcat’s well-loved sisal rope scratching post or the fibrous innards of a dried gourd.

More often than not, Trump’s hairstyle doesn’t scream billionaire. Instead, it sometimes looks like someone swept up a llama groomer’s leavings, dyed them yellow, and fashioned them into a springy fur patty held together with scented polymers and a prayer. However, Trump does spend a considerable amount of money on his hair. In 2020, The New York Times obtained several years of his tax returns and reported that he claimed $70,000 in deductions for hairstyling costs while shooting “The Apprentice.”

Back when Trump had more strands at his disposal, perhaps it wasn’t quite as costly to construct his coiffure. It became more elaborate as it thinned out, sparking speculation that he was maybe getting a little help padding his pate. The wig rumors seemed to humble him a bit, as he tweeted in 2013, “My hair may not be perfect but it’s mine.” Over the years, Trump has also experimented with several different hairstyles.

There have been many strange claims about Donald Trump’s hair and why it looks the way it does. Eventually, it almost seemed to become a separate entity with a vague resemblance to a varmint of some sort. But earlier in his real estate career, it wasn’t the much-discussed curiosity it has become today.

When The New York Times profiled Donald in 1984, all that columnist William E. Geist found noteworthy about his hair was its length, which Geist described as an anomaly among executives of the era. That same year, what stood out to journalist Graydon Carter was Donald’s shaggy eyebrows and the slicked-down hair covering his ears. In a piece for GQ, Carter compared the latter to the hairstyle of the late George Steinbrenner during his more hirsute days.

By the late ’80s, Donald seemed to be competing with his then-wife, Ivana Trump, to see who could build the tallest Trump Tower atop their scalps. The pair are pictured above at the 1988 US Open Tennis Championships, where Donald’s hair appears to be its natural color at the time: dishwater blond. He also looks like a cross between Elvis Presley and Al Pacino in “Scarface” with his thick sideburns, pompadour throwback, partially unbuttoned collared shirt, and crisp blazer. It’s possible he was trying to channel the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll, as he took to Instagram in 2024 to claim, “For so many years people have been saying that Elvis and I look alike.”

Sebastian Stan scored an Academy Award nomination for his portrayal of Donald Trump in a 2024 movie that repurposed the name of the tycoon’s NBC reality series: “The Apprentice.” One of the film’s most controversial scenes is based on an account Ivana Trump shared in a divorce deposition. According to Harry Hurt III’s book “Lost Tycoon: The Many Lives of Donald J. Trump,” Ivana once alleged that an enraged Donald raped her in 1989 after he underwent botched scalp reduction surgery. Ivana’s plastic surgeon, Dr. Steven Hoefflin, reportedly performed the procedure to surgically remove Donald’s bald spot. “The Donald starts ripping out Ivana’s hair by the handful, as if he is trying to make her feel the same kind of pain that he is feeling,” Hurt writes of the alleged assault. In a footnote in the book, Ivana walks back her claim, saying, “I referred to this as a ‘rape,’ but I do not want my words to be interpreted in a literal or criminal sense.”

Hurt shares other details of Donald’s cosmetic procedure, writing that Hoefflin covered up what remained of his bald spot by tattooing it. Donald is described as being furious because the ink was darker than his hair. Of course, he has insisted that none of this happened.

If Donald did get his scalp rearranged, it didn’t spare him from having to wear his hair styled in a comb-over. When he joined Michael Jackson on a flight in 1990, his pouf wasn’t quite as elevated, and some stray hairs had collapsed onto his forehead.

If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault, help is available. Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network website or contact RAINN’s National Helpline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).

After Ivana Trump divorced Donald Trump in 1990, he reportedly became reclusive and quit cutting his hair. According to Vanity Fair, when a friend compared him to famed film producer Howard Hughes, he took it as a compliment, saying, “Thanks, I admire him.” However, the pal likely wasn’t thinking of Hughes’ success but the way he became a shut-in.

Donald’s hair was still shaggy in 1991 when he attended the US Open with his second wife, Marla Maples. It curled on his neck, and he had clearly grown the front extra long and swooped it back. It wasn’t yet the color of Hughes’ collection of liquid gold (as legend has it, he urinated in jars), but that would soon change, possibly because Donald discovered Just for Men. The boxed hair dye hit drugstore shelves in the late ’80s, and it allowed Donald to bleach the ashy-ness out of his blond from the comfort of his home.

According to author Michael Wolff, Donald rarely left the dye on long enough, which is where his hair’s distinctive yellow tint came from. In his book “Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House,” Wolff outs Donald’s daughter Ivanka Trump as the one who spilled this beauty secret. He also claims Ivanka has allegedly told her friends that her dad’s comb-over hides a huge bald spot.

Due to a ban on CFC-based aerosol hairsprays in the late ’80s, Donald Trump could no longer use one of his favorite styling products to tame his mane. He often bemoaned the state of modern hairsprays on the campaign trail, telling a group of North Carolina rallygoers in 2015 that he sometimes has to take drastic measures when the newer products don’t provide the results he wants. “It comes out in big globs, right, and it’s stuck in your hair and you say, ‘Oh my God, I’ve got to take a shower again, my hair is all screwed up,'” he complained, per The New York Times.

Trump’s hair did start looking a bit deflated after the ban took effect. In 1997, he was photographed planting a wet one on the reigning Miss Universe at the time, Alicia Machado. But the wings over his ears were looking a lot moister than his lips, so perhaps he was experimenting with a new spray or gel that he hadn’t yet figured out how to apply properly. Or perhaps he was more concerned about the appearance of the woman he was kissing than his over-lubricated, claw-shaped sideburns. In 2016, Machado told CNN that Trump bullied her over her weight. She accused him of calling her “Miss Piggy,” adding, “He was really rude.” It took some real hubris to insult someone else’s looks with his hair looking like that.

In the early aughts, Donald Trump’s trademark hair overhang started teetering forward, coming dangerously close to touching his untamed eyebrows, which were stretching toward it in Grinch-like arches. In 2004, hairstylist John Maechling told the Los Angeles Times the hairstyle wasn’t actually a comb-over but a “wraparound.” He explained that creating the look is a more intricate process, as the hair has to be swirled in front of the forehead. This would explain its slightly scalloped appearance in the above photo. But why it has the same greasy sheen and burnt-corn-tortilla color of a Trump Tower Grill taco bowl is anyone’s guess.

Donald dedicated an entire chapter of his 2004 book “Trump: How to Get Rich” to his hair. He reiterates that he doesn’t wear a hairpiece but says it’s something he would consider doing. When explaining why, he writes, “I, like most men, am very vain.” He also confesses, “I color my hair. Somehow, the color never looks great, but what the hell, I just don’t like gray hair.”

Also, in 2004, Donald answered a few more burning questions fans might have about his crowning glory in a Playboy interview. He revealed that his then-girlfriend Melania Trump was responsible for cutting it, saying, “She’s much more artistic than my hair would indicate … She’s not trying to reinvent the wheel.” He also shared that his hair’s crunchy appearance is not the result of blasting it with a blow dryer, as he prefers to let it air-dry. “It takes about an hour … Once it’s dry I comb it,” he stated. “Once I have it the way I like it — even though nobody else likes it — I spray it and it’s good for the day.”

By the time Donald Trump’s reign as a boardroom overlord was in full swing on “The Apprentice,” he had adopted the hairstyle that most probably picture when they think of him: an airy tuft jutting out over his temple that resembles a clump of sunbaked vegetation. But while he loved flinging out the words “You’re fired!” on his NBC show, sending his hairdresser packing was not the solution to his follicular failings. 

According to Amy Lasch, a hairstylist who worked on “The Apprentice,” Donald’s crispy coif was a mess of his own making. “Everything was solid. It was matted to stay put. I tapped it with my comb and it would bounce back,” she told the Mirror, adding that she did little more than comb the segments of Donald’s hair that weren’t impenetrable when he came to the set with his strands already doused in hairspray. She also criticized Melania Trump’s handiwork, saying of her at-home hack job on the back of Donald’s hair, “It was scary. It was just cut in a straight line.”

While Donald seemed determined to keep his bouffant in place, a top layer flaked off at the 2004 Emmy Awards. As seen above, the sun highlighted its frayed fibers. That same year, he appeared on “Larry King Live” and said he was well aware that “Apprentice” viewers hated his hair, but he suggested that the show’s ratings would take a nosedive if he tried changing it.

Donald Trump and Melania Trump’s 2005 wedding was a star-studded affair, but Donald didn’t want to spend too much of his own money on the lavish event. Before getting hitched, he shared one savings secret with The Sunday Times: “I’ll do my own hair … unfortunately for the world.”

By the time he had settled into his third marriage, Donald had clearly perfected his procedure for curling his long fringe into a neat tube. His hair often resembled a buttery croissant — without a flaky flyaway to be seen. It was his go-style in 2006, the year Stormy Daniels claimed Trump had an extramarital affair with her.

According to comedian Seth Rogen, who worked with Daniels on the movies “The 40-Year-Old Virgin” and “Knocked Up,” she once related to him a conversation she and Donald had about his hair. “He said to her that he had had a dream like Samson and Delilah and that he felt as though his power rested in his hair, and that if he lost it, he would lose his power and his stature,” Rogen recalled in the “Stormy” documentary. According to Daniels, this biblically inspired belief is why Donald was afraid to change his look.

Long before Jimmy Fallon regretted ruffling Donald Trump’s hair during an interview, the eponymous host of “On Air with Ryan Seacrest” asked his co-host at the time, Ellen K., to bury her hands in Trump’s comb-over to see if it remained intact. If Trump had also been concerned about dusting Ellen K’s fingers with dandruff during that 2010 interview, perhaps he would have been more hesitant to let her touch it. But he has learned that great hair can’t have flakes.

Describing his haircare routine to Rolling Stone in 2011, Trump revealed, “OK, what I do is, wash it with Head and Shoulders.” He also said that we’ve been using the wrong term to describe his hairstyle. “It’s not really a comb-over,” he insisted. “It’s sort of a little bit forward and back.”

He stuck with the hairstyle for his Comedy Central Roast that same year. His deep side part is slightly crooked, and his wet ear wings are gleaming in the photo with Snoop Dogg above. During the event, Trump roasted his own hair by joking, “What’s the difference between a wet raccoon and Donald Trump’s hair? A wet raccoon doesn’t have seven f***in’ billion dollars in the bank.” On “Jimmy Kimmel Live,” comedian Jeff Ross said that it wasn’t being compared to a drenched dumpster-diving creature that bothered Trump about the joke but that the original version only placed his value at $2 billion (via Vulture).

While campaigning for the Republican presidential nomination in 2015, Donald Trump dissed one of his rivals, Marco Rubio, by telling voters in Iowa, “By the way, I have better hair than he does, believe me,” per CNN. However, Trump soon suggested that he might bid adieu to his superior hairstyle.

A few days later, Trump told another group of Iowans that he would probably adopt a less labor-intensive hair routine as president. “I wouldn’t have time, because if I were in the White House, I’d be working my a** off,” he explained, per the Des Moines Register. However, he never did fully adopt the slicked-back look he described.

Trump would have benefited from a more aerodynamic hairstyle when he visited his Turnberry Golf Club in Scotland that same year. As you can see, he still hadn’t figured out how to wind-proof his forehead poof, but at least he was making an attempt to diminish those stubborn, brassy tones. Two years into his presidency, he revealed that keeping his blond locks plastered in place was a top priority. “I try like hell to hide that bald spot, folks,” he said at CPAC 2018 (via CNN).

During his 2024 hush-money trial, Donald Trump’s hairstyle was worse than usual. It resembled the scribbling of an angry toddler, and the color had reverted back to that unnatural yellow hue that “Westworld” star Evan Rachel Wood once described to Vanity Fair as “sick dog poo.” A source told Page Six the processed cheese tint was the result of Trump refusing to listen to his hairdresser’s recommendation for how long to leave his hair dye on. “Friends say he’s so impatient that he rarely gives the stylist the 30 to 45 minutes … The shorter time he gives them, the more orange his hair gets,” the insider explained.

A shot of Trump’s hair from behind revealed his bald spot during the trial, despite his efforts to make his locks lush again — in 2017, Dr. Harold N. Bornstein told The New York Times Trump was taking the hair regrowth drug Propecia. Two months after the closing arguments in his hush-money trial, Trump admitted that his mane was looking a bit sad, per Fox News. Upon seeing his hair on a screen, he told a crowd of supporters in Michigan, “That’s very severe, that comb-over that’s a severe sucker. It looks OK from the other side, but that is very severe. I apologize.”

When Donald Trump convinced America to let him back into the White House in 2025, his hair transformed into a fluffy cloud floating high over his brow. It looked drained of its color, so at least it didn’t bring to mind toxic smog from a post-apocalyptic future where all those birds he worries about being killed by wind turbines can’t even take to the skies anymore.

Unfortunately for Trump, if his hair was drifting in the sky instead of above his head, it wouldn’t fall into the cumulus category; it would be considered a wispy cirrus cloud. In the above photo, there’s a lot of pink scalp peeking out from the large gaps between his teased tresses — a sign that one of the hair and makeup habits Trump needs to stop is over-inflating his comb-over. Fans got to see what Trump would look like with a sleek hair makeover when he removed his MAGA hat after a round of golf in 2024.

Trump can’t make his hair spring back into place after stuffing it underneath a hat, but after spending years complaining about how water efficiency standards affect his hair, he took his revenge against weak shower heads. “You turn on the shower — if you’re like me, you can’t wash your beautiful hair properly,” he said in 2020, per CNN. One of the first executive orders he signed in 2025 relaxed energy efficiency regulations on shower heads, so perhaps now he can get that bracing blast of water pressure he needs to remove all that hairspray.