No, Donald Trump is Still Sharp: “Person. Woman. Camera. Man. TV.” These were the iconic words that Donald J. Trump proudly exclaimed in an interview with Fox News Channel’s Dr. Marc Siegel while he was running for reelection in 2020. Those words spoken by Trump were meant as a cipher to relay to the world that he was, in fact, not cognitively impaired. Trump was 73 years-old at the time of that infamous interview.

Today, he is 77 and, if reelected to the presidency in 2024, he will be 78 when he’s sworn in. 

People are understandably questioning whether the forty-fifth president is all there mentally. This is especially so, given the fact that Trump’s behavior is so erratic.

For Trump’s enemies, it is a great way to deflect or to blunt the very many—serious—questions about President Joe Biden’s own cognitive abilities. 

Other than the erratic behavior, which Donald Trump has always exhibited, Trump is a model of mental health compared to the current president. Trump rants and raves at his rallies; he rages against the Faceless Men from the so-called “Deep State” which pursue with great vigor. 

Yet, Donald Trump is not suffering from cognitive decline. Fast-talking, funny, and a quick thinker on his feet, Trump exhibits none of the characteristics that come from the kind of cognitive impairment that the cognitive test Trump proudly passed in 2020 is meant to test. 

Is Donald Trump Nuts?

It very well could be that Trump is insane. Although, that’s different from being cognitively impaired.

This is something that a group of 27 psychiatrists and other mental health experts submitted as their professional opinion in 2017. In fact, they wrote an entire book essentially arguing that Trump suffered from a variety of mental ailments—including malignant narcissism—that was a New York Times bestseller the year that it was released. 

Of course, not a single person involved in this group was a Republican or shared any sympathies with the Right. 

What’s more, they defied the “Goldwater Rule” that governs the mental health profession. The Goldwater Rule forbids any mental health expert from offering a “professional opinion unless he or she has conducted an examination and has been granted proper authorization for such a statement.” 

What drove these mental health experts was not a legitimate concern for the republic. These individuals were driven by their extreme politics and their “Trump Derangement Syndrome.” Tellingly, a mere 27 mental health experts were willing to defy the Goldwater Rule.

While I am not a mental health expert, actual medical experts who were in charge of Trump’s care while he was president have publicly stated that they saw no evidence of mental illness or cognitive decline. Take from that what you will. But for mental health professionals to have made the claims they did about Trump in their bestselling book—without any real pushback from the wider medical community—was deeply concerning. 

Indeed, it was almost Soviet in nature.

After all, in the Soviet Union anyone who dared question communism or the current Red ruler was subject to being arrested and placed in a mental health institution where they would suffer a fate worse than death. Under the guise of “scientific socialism”, Soviet scientists would conduct the most gruesome experiments on political dissidents with the intention of reprogramming these ideological resisters into being good and loyal subjects of the Soviet Union.

We are thankfully not yet there. 

But the fact that earnest questions about Trump’s cognitive capabilities as it relates to his advanced age have been mutated by partisan medical practitioners into questioning his sanity for political purposes should scare everyone. It’s a slippery—and fast—slope from where we are today to where the savage Soviet treatment of politically inconvenient citizens eventually led.

Joe Biden is the Senile One

Just as a matter of context, Joe Biden has repeatedly made comments that have sounded, frankly, batty. He routinely confuses world leaders with whom he is meeting. Biden has spoken to people on stage who were not there; going so far as to shake an invisible person’s hand. 

President Biden lies as a matter of course. Biden is a known fabricator throughout his career. Yet, the kind of lies he tells today make some people question if he is manipulating them or if he is covering for his forgetfulness—just as patients suffering from dementia or Alzheimer’s routinely do. 

Biden also tends to get irate with people who question him. Trump did that, too. When Trump did it, though, he was far more cogent and in command of his faculties than Joe Biden ever has been. 

Whatever one’s opinion of Donald Trump, I think it’s fair to say that he is many things. Senile is not one of them. Which is more than I can say his likely Democratic rival in the 2024 Presidential Election, Joe Biden.

About the Author

Brandon J. Weichert is a former Congressional staffer and geopolitical analyst who is a contributor at The Washington Times, as well as at American Greatness and the Asia Times. He is the author of Winning Space: How America Remains a Superpower (Republic Book Publishers), Biohacked: China’s Race to Control Life (May 16), and The Shadow War: Iran’s Quest for Supremacy. Weichert can be followed via Twitter @WeTheBrandon.