Trump insists he has the ‘highest of IQs’ and it’s something he got from his uncle who taught at MIT

President Donald Trump suggested in an interview with TIME that his intelligence is among the highest anywhere and that he owes it to heredity from his late uncle. Asked whether he trusted OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman, Trump turned instead to the subject of his uncle, Dr. John Trump, who spent 41 years at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "I believe in genetics," Trump said, according to The Independent.

The uncle was an MIT engineering professor and cancer research pioneer who received the National Medal of Science from Ronald Reagan in 1983. He died in 1985. The interview also covered Trump's conflict with the press, the Iran war, his redesign of the capital and his enthusiasm for artificial intelligence.

Social media users ridiculed the remark, noting that intelligence would pass from parents or grandparents, not an uncle. Trump has invoked the relative before. In 2024 he posted an old photo of him at MIT, and in a 2016 campaign speech he credited the family's "good genes." Last year he wrongly said his uncle had taught Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski. Then-press secretary Karoline Leavitt responded that the president is proud of his family and keeps a letter from his uncle in the Oval Office dining room.

Summarized by PolitiKool from The Independent’s reporting. Read the full story at The Independent →