President Joe Biden is preparing for his annual physical, but the White House has ruled out a cognitive test for the 81-year-old commander in chief despite the growing calls for just such a test.
Every president undergoes a physical examination each year so physicians can keep an eye on the national leader’s health and stave off any emerging health issues to keep the president fit and ready to govern.
But Joe Biden has a particular issue that is at the top of everyone’s mind as he rolls into the last year of his current term in office: Voters want to know if he is mentally sharp enough to tackle the job of president of the United States.
It is certainly a thorny issue. If he is found to be senile and unable to handle the presidency, that would leave the nation with Vice President Kamala Harris as president — even if for only the next 10 months. It also would leave the Democrats with the dilemma of replacing him on the ballot for an election that is only nine months off.
So, if Biden is non compos mentis, the nation needs to know as soon as possible so that remedies to these dire issues can be set in place.
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But the defiant White House is standing directly in the way of this determination, indicating the president would not undergo a cognitive test.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters during her news briefing on Monday that it isn’t necessary for Biden.
When Jean-Pierre was asked about including a cognitive test in the president’s physical, she replied, “I’m just going to say what the, what Dr. O’Connor — it’s kind of a — what he said to me about a year ago when the report came out last year, obviously, on his physical, which is the president proves every day how he operates, how he thinks — right? — by dealing with world leaders, by making really difficult decisions on behalf of the American people, whether it’s domestic, whether it’s national security. And so, he shows it every day on how he thinks, how he operates. And so, that is how — that is how Dr. O’Connor sees it. And that’s how I’m going to leave it.”
She was referring to a report that Dr. Kevin O’Connor, Biden’s personal physician, released in February 2023 that said he was “fit to successfully execute the duties of the Presidency.”
O’Connor said Biden had undergone an “extremely detailed neurologic exam,” but there was no mention in his summary of cognitive testing.
Jean-Pierre had answered a similar question during her Feb. 9 briefing by saying O’Connor “didn’t believe that a test like that was warranted because of just who he is as president of the United States and everything that he has to deal with.”
Biden, of course, has clearly been in decline over the last few years. The more vital Joe Biden who ran for the presidency in 2008, the one we saw on the stump for Barack Obama until 2016, and even the Joe Biden who campaigned for president in 2019 and 2020 is not the Joe Biden we have today.
The man who sits in the White House often seems confused when he speaks or unable to decide where he should walk afterward. He can’t remember names, tells the same debunked and false stories over and over, and this week even said he had recently talked to a world leader who has been dead for many years.
The issue is even more pressing now, especially in light of the Feb. 8 report by special counsel Robert Hur, who was looking into whether Biden broke the law by storing classified documents in the garage of his Delaware home.
Hur conducted an extensive interview with Biden in an attempt to assess what the president knew of the documents found in his garage, home and offices.
But the special counsel came away feeling that it would be very difficult to prosecute the president on the records issue.
Hur wrote that “at trial, Mr. Biden would likely present himself to a jury, as he did during our interview of him, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”
Could Biden pass a cognitive exam?
After the release of this damning report, though, polls have found that most Americans feel Biden is not fit for his office.
An ABC News/Ipsos poll released Sunday found that 86 percent said he is too old to serve a second term as president. And, more troubling for Biden’s party, even 73 percent of Democrats agreed that he is too old for a second term.
Polling otherwise is even worse for Biden, as he is the least-favored president in modern history.
Certainly, there is nothing shameful about losing one’s mental acuity as one ages. Almost all of us will get there if we live long enough. More often than not, humans begin a quick decline once they hit 80. It does not mean that every person becomes a mentally diminished child, of course. But it is simply not arguable that an 80-year-old man is just as fit and sharp as he was as a far younger version of himself.
Americans need to know if Joe Biden is fit to lead — and his annual physical should include a cognitive test.
