Donald Trump’s youngest son and only child with Melania Trump has remained largely out of the public eye, much like the former president’s children. Well, until recently. Barron Trump, who just turned 18, is currently a freshman at New York University and a burgeoning political advisor to his father.
For the past two weeks, my TikTok For You page has been filled with posts from New York University students posting clips of Barron Trump attending class as if he were a Sasquatch. The videos are all blurry and shot in a hurry, and mostly show fellow students trying to do something. Tracking the once-elusive Trump. These cryptic videos, set to songs such as Chamillionaire’s “Ridin'” and featuring wonky camera angles, are culled from “Day in My Life”-style student videos and posted on dozens of sites on TikTok and Instagram. It has been reposted on Baron Stan’s account.
These posts get millions of views and look like paparazzi photos. The angle of the camera suggests that the people filming are trying to hide it under their backpacks or sweaters. A new genre of baron memes is flourishing.
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“Barron could have gone to any school, but the fact that he chose one of the most liberal schools in the country speaks volumes,” said New York University student Grace Rowley, who posted about Barron on TikTok. It tells a story,” he said. “I was shocked and intrigued that he chose NYU. I would love to talk to him and read his ‘Why NYU’ essay.”
These kinds of predictions have been part of the Barron magazine story for years.
Before September, Baron was shrouded in mystery. He had no social media accounts and rarely appeared in public. For eight years, his personal life and interests were left to the public imagination. In 2020, a rumor spread on TikTok that a former classmate had identified his Roblox username “JumpyTurtlee.” The account’s profile said the user was a fan of anime and K-pop, and supported LGBTQ+ rights. Although this rumor was never confirmed, it became part of Barron’s online mythology. Users grabbed clips of him looking somber, making it sound as if he was miserable and disrespecting his father, and posted them with the hashtag #savebarron2020.
Baron has been the subject of dozens of fan fictions on sites like Archive of Our Own and Wattpad, as well as fan accounts that reuse the same clips and images over and over. As Slate writer Luke Winkie pointed out earlier this year, for anyone with even a passing interest in the Trump family, Barron has become a blank canvas on which to project their own “fantasies.”
