He has been mocking Joe Biden for months and boasting of being an energetic leader in front of what he calls a decrepit 81-year-old old man, but age does not forgive and the 78 years that Donald Trump turns this Friday also raise questions about his capabilities in the middle of the campaign for the House White.
Whether Democrat Biden wins the Nov. 5 election or Trump wins, each would be the oldest American president to be sworn in.
The former Republican president (2017-2021) celebrated his birthday with a large party and political rally in a gigantic convention center near Mar-a-Lago, his luxury residence in Florida, in the southeastern United States.
After a “happy birthday” sung by the crowd and a cake placed next to his lectern, Trump used his usual inflammatory rhetoric to attack migrants and, above all, his opponent Biden, who according to him “falls asleep at every rally.” .
“On the first day of our new administration, we will close the border, stop the invasion and send Joe Biden’s illegal aliens back home where they belong. We have to kick them out,” he launched.
The Democrat had written to him earlier on the social network X: “Happy 78th birthday, Donald. Take it from one old man to another: age is just a number.” “This election, however, is a choice,” he wrote before listing his program differences on abortion or climate change.
Yet the polls are clear: Many more Americans believe the current president is too old for a second term than those who complain about Trump’s age.
The octogenarian Biden objectively shows recurring signs of fatigue: his gait is increasingly stiff and he sometimes seems dazed.
Videos of the American president walking away, emaciated, from a group of G7 leaders, stumbling or stuttering, are widely shared on social media.
However, it’s not just him. In recent months, Trump has also mixed up the names of several cities and leaders, warned that the world was heading toward a second world war instead of a third, and launched disjointed tirades.
– Bugs, tremors –
On Thursday, in a closed-door meeting with Republican congressmen, he reportedly described Milwaukee, a strategic city in many ways for the US elections, as “horrible”, which provoked an avalanche of criticism and questions.
Are these mistakes, the videos in which he holds on to a railing to avoid slipping or shakes while drinking a glass of water, are examples of the former president’s decline? It is not known, but Biden’s campaign team uses it to attack him.
On the occasion of Trump’s birthday, the Democratic president’s camp published a statement on Friday accompanied by a large-format and very unflattering photograph of the Republican in which he is seen sweating, with red cheeks and haggard features.
“Happy birthday, Donald. You are a criminal, a failure, an impostor and a threat to our democracy,” said James Singer, spokesman for Biden’s campaign team, in the note.
“On behalf of America, here’s an early gift for your 79th birthday: We will make sure you never become president again,” he added.
– “Zombie” –
These comments irritated Trump’s team, which in turn described Biden as “weak and incompetent.” “He is a brain-dead zombie,” a spokeswoman said in a statement sent to AFP.
Debates about the age of American presidents are not new.
During Ronald Reagan’s second term, some analysts were already wondering about the deterioration of his intellectual abilities.
Former US President Jimmy Carter sounded the alarm in a 1994 message in which he expressed concern about the “danger” posed to the United States by the possibility of a president’s capabilities being diminished by a “neurological disease.”
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