The East African Diaspora Media Watch (EADM)

By Rebecca Seales and agencies

In Summary: Love him or hate him, the 45th president of the United States Donald Trump is guaranteed to make history.  The maverick Republican, it is a fact, set a range of records as soon as he occupied the Oval Office on Friday November 20, 2017.  From his age to his mysterious bank balance, via his notable lack of pets - here are just some of "The Donald's" historic "firsts" that placed him in the company, for good or worse,  of American iconic figures.

Washington Dc, USA—Love him or hate him, the 45th president of the United States Donald Trump is guaranteed to make history. Whether you love or loathe him, it's a fact that the maverick Republican set a range of records as soon as he occupied the Oval Office.  From his age to his mysterious bank balance, via his notable lack of pets - here are just some of "The Donald's" historic "firsts"  that placed him in the company, for good or worse,  of American iconic figures.

1. Oldest incoming president

Donald Trump celebrated his 70th birthday on 14 June,2016 which makes him the oldest man in US history to assume the presidency. The previous record-holder, Ronald Reagan, was 69 when he took office in 1981. Perhaps keen to allay fears about his senior status, the business mogul had his doctor prepare a gushing letter pledging that he would be "the healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency".

The average age of all 44 previous incoming presidents is a sprightly 55.  The youngest ever incumbent - Theodore Roosevelt - got the job aged 42 years and 322 days, after President William McKinley's assassination in 1901.

2. The first billionaire president

Mr. Trump is the first billionaire president. Exact estimates of his personal wealth vary, with Forbes putting it at $3.7bn (£3bn) and the man himself claiming in a statement that it's "in excess of TEN BILLION DOLLARS".  Many of America's past presidents have also been extremely wealthy, of course. Recent estimates say George Washington's estate would be worth half a billion in today's dollars.

Before his 1963 assassination, JFK reportedly lived off a $10m trust fund thanks to the vast wealth of his father - investor and alleged bootlegger Joseph P Kennedy, Sr. Mr. Trump will be following in the footsteps of former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger by taking just a symbolic dollar as a salary.

3. The richest cabinet

When Mr. Trump began unveiling his cabinet picks, the number with fat wallets quickly drew the scorn of Democrats. "Donald Trump's administration: of, by and for the millionaires and billionaires," tweeted Vermont Senator and former Democrat presidential contender Bernie Sanders.  For better or worse, this will be the wealthiest administration in modern American history.  According to the Washington Post, commerce secretary nominee Wilbur Ross is worth around $2.5bn on his own - roughly 10 times what George W Bush's first cabinet were worth in 2001, when the media branded them an assembly of millionaires.

Treasury appointee Steven Mnuchin quite literally bought a bank after 17 years at Goldman Sachs, and reports put his wealth at over $40m. It has been estimated that the cabinet could be good for an eye-watering $35bn, all told. As Quartz pointed out, this is more than the annual gross domestic product of Bolivia, a country in Central America.

4. Least experienced politically

Mr. Trump's triumph was also significant because, until now, no-one has been elected president in more than 60 years without experience as a state governor or in Congress. The last president with no political experience, Dwight Eisenhower, was Supreme Commander of Allied Forces in World War Two, before he was elected to office in 1953.

But as Mr. Trump tells it, his lack of links to the Washington establishment is an asset not a flaw - and more than made up for by his experience as a deal-maker.

5. Most powerful children

Mr. Trump has named his son-in-law, real estate developer Jared Kushner, as a senior adviser - prompting cries of nepotism from opponents.  Some claim the appointment makes the 36-year-old the most powerful presidential son-in-law in US history. He isn't the first to fit that profile, however. President Woodrow Wilson's Treasury Secretary, William Gibbs McAdoo, was also married to his daughter, Eleanor.

That said, their case pre-dates America's 1967 anti-nepotism statute, and Mr. McAdoo was already a cabinet secretary when he wed. Ivanka Trump, Mr. Trump's elder daughter and wife of Mr. Kushner, is now also being spoken of as the most influential "First Daughter" ever.

6. Fewest White House pets

So much fuss has been made of what Donald Trump owns that you might have missed one glaring absence - a pet. It looks likely that he'll be the first US President in over a century not to have an animal pal in the White House, after plans to have him adopt a goldendoodle dog reportedly fell through. According to the Presidential Pet Museum, almost every commander-in-chief has had a pet, and some had a virtual menagerie. John F Kennedy stands out for owning a veritable Noah's Ark - everything from a rabbit named sa Zsa to a canary called Robin - but the crown belongs to Calvin and Grace Coolidge (White House occupants from 1923-1929), who the museum says "quite literally had a zoo".

Their animal companions included at least a dozen dogs, a donkey named Ebenezer, and various creatures presented as gifts by foreign dignitaries - among them lion cubs, a wallaby, a pygmy hippo named Billy, and a black bear.

7. Most adamantly anti free-trade

Donald Trump won the presidency on a pro-job platform, and blamed free-trade policies for the collapse of the US manufacturing industry. This is a rare stance for a US president; probably last seen in his fellow Republican Herbert Hoover in the 1930s. In September 2015, Mr. Trump told the Economist China is "killing us", and that millions of Americans are "tired of being ripped off".  He said that as president, he would consider a 12% import tax to make the Chinese "stop playing games". During his election campaign, Mr. Trump also threatened to rip up Nafta, the free trade agreement between Canada, the US and Mexico, which has been in place for 23 years.

He also vowed that the US would quit the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, a 12-nation agreement, on his first day in the White House. And he surely made good on that campaign pledge when he signed one of the first executive order that delivered a final death blow to the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal on Monday January 23, 2017.

8. The First Lady's firsts

Former model Melania Trump is as trailblazing as her husband.  She is the first presidential spouse from Slovenia, and the first non-native English speaker. She is only the second FLOTUS born outside the US, though - the first being Louisa Adams, wife of the sixth US President, John Quincy Adams (1825-1829), who was born in London. As Mr. Trump has been married twice before, Melania will also be the first third wife to reside in the White House. The only other US president to have divorced was Ronald Reagan, who split from his first wife, actress Jane Wyman, long before leading the nation. Melania speaks Slovenian, English, French, German, and Serbian, and may be the most competent linguist to hold the role of FLOTUS.

She is the first president's wife to have posed nude, for GQ magazine in 2000 among others.  Mr. Trump is no stranger to men's magazines either. He appeared on the cover of Playboy in March 1990 with the tag-line: "Nice magazine, want to sell it?" So, whether you love or loathe him, President Donald J. Trump wields 8 ‘firsts’ that make history.

Source: BBC News

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-38637123