#Taylor Swift Named Time’s Person of the Year

The Taylor Swift era continues.

The superstar singer-songwriter has been named Time‘s 2023 Person of the Year, the first time that an entertainer has received the honor from the long-running publication.

Time announced the Person of the Year Wednesday morning.

“The selections over the years have tended to follow certain patterns. The person chosen has typically been a ruler over traditional domains of power. He—and yes, usually it has been a ‘he’—is very often a politician or a titan of industry. Fourteen U.S. presidents, five leaders of Russia or the Soviet Union and three Popes have all been recognized,” the magazine’s editor Sam Jacobs wrote about naming Swift.

“And yet the person whose singular influence was revealed throughout 2023 has held none of these roles—or anything remotely similar,” it added. “Every year contains light and dark; 2023 was a year with significant shares of darkness. In a divided world, where too many institutions are failing, Taylor Swift found a way to transcend borders and be a source of light. No one else on the planet today can move so many people so well.”

Swift, of course, is in the midst of her global Eras Tour, and has had three number one albums this year. Time notes that she has had more No. 1 albums than any woman in history.

In the cover story, Swift addressed a number of hot-button topics, from her ongoing tour, her relationship with NFL star Travis Kelce (Swift says it began when he called her out on his podcast, “which I thought was metal as hell”), and Scooter Braun’s acquisition of her masters: “With the Scooter thing, my masters were being sold to someone who actively wanted them for nefarious reasons, in my opinion.”

Time also named soccer star Lionel Messi its athlete of the year and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman its CEO of the year.

In 2022, Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky and the “Spirit of Ukraine” took top honors, while Elon Musk was named Person of the Year in 2021. President Biden and Vice President Harris were the 2020 recipients.

This year’s shortlist for Person of the Year also included Barbie, Hollywood strikers, King Charles III, Fed chairman Jerome Powell, Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin and Trump prosecutors.