Time Magazine will release their Person of the Year cover on Thursday. Last year’s POTY was Taylor Swift, which ended up being a really good choice? Taylor was honored and she gave them an in-depth interview about her life and her amazing 2023. On Monday, Time’s editor revealed their POTY shortlist for 2024. The ten-person shortlist includes: Kamala Harris, Kate Middleton, Elon Musk, Yulia Navalnaya, Benjamin Netanyahu, Fed chair Jerome Powell, Joe Rogan, Claudia Sheinbaum, Donald Trump and Mark Zuckerberg. You read that correctly – the Princess of Wales was shortlisted alongside Elon Muskrat, Orangina and Alexei Navalny’s widow. The situation in Syria broke too late in the process for them to include the now-deposed and possibly dead Bashar al-Assad. As for Kate… here’s her POTY shortlist blurb:

The Princess of Wales made international headlines this year and stirred a conversation about privacy and health for public figures. In January, Kate Middleton was hospitalized for two weeks for a “planned abdominal surgery” and Kensington Palace said she would be out of the public eye until Easter. But after conspiracy theories circulated online in March about Middleton’s whereabouts, the royal put the rumors to rest by revealing that she had been diagnosed with cancer. In September, Middleton announced that she had completed her chemotherapy treatment. Middleton was previously on the TIME100 list of Most Influential People in 2013, and one of the runners-up for Person of the Year in 2011.

[From Time]

I mean… people have short memories and everyone has recency bias, but the first three months of the year were f–king wild when it came to Kate-gate or the Kate Missington saga. There was so much chatter, so many conspiracies, so many profoundly strange things happening all at once. The Mother’s Day photo fiasco, which hijacked Oscar night (and the day after) as photo agencies issued an unprecedented kill order on a palace-released photo. Don’t forget the staged photos with a Kate double, published in The Sun. Then the bizarre bench video which some believed had been manipulated. That strange TMZ photo-op where Kate rode shotgun with her mom. And don’t forget William’s bizarre behavior either. I wouldn’t be surprised if Kate was a major POTY contender, but yeah… they’ll probably go with Elon or Joe Rogan. Those two really altered the course of history (for the worse).

Also: royalists are trying to make this into a “win” for Kate because something something Meghan. Like… POTY isn’t necessarily a good thing or an honor. If Kate wins, it means that she had a big year for going missing while the palace completely bungled their comms.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images, The Sun, Kensington Palace.