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Former President Donald Trump’s rambling and increasingly angry speeches focused on the past have increased concerns about his age and fitness to serve another term in the White House.
The 78-year-old former president has recently suggested there was an audience at his September 10 debate with Vice President Kamala Harris when there was none, and he has indicated that North Korea is attempting to assassinate him when he’s likely to have meant Iran. He misspeaks and misremembers things to such a degree that it no longer appears to garner much attention.
In September, more than a month after President Joe Biden left the race, Trump was talking as if he was still running against him and not Harris.
Following the departure of Biden, Trump is the oldest nominee of a major party in US history and he would become the oldest president ever if he wins and finishes another term, at the end of which he would be 82 years old.
Over the course of the nine years that Trump has spent on the political scene, his speeches have grown bleaker, longer, and more focused on the past, according to a review by The New York Times. The outlet found that Trump’s speeches now last on average 82 minutes compared to 45 minutes in 2016.
He also uses all-or-nothing terms such as “always” and “never” 13 percent more today than he did eight years ago. Some experts see this as an indication that someone is aging.
He uses 32 percent more negative words than positive ones currently – in 2016 that figure was 21 percent – another possible sign of changes in cognitive ability. He also uses 69 percent more swear words than during his first campaign.
Frequently during speeches, he reaches back to the 1980s and 1990s and often much further back in time, as he mentions the fictional character Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs, suggesting that talk show host Johnny Carson should be brought back despite that he died in 2005. Trump has also said that “most people don’t have any idea what the hell a phone app is” even as 96 percent of people in the US have a smartphone, The Times notes.
Anthony Scaramucci served as the White House communications director for 10 days during the Trump administration. He’s now backing Harris. He told The Times that “he’s not competing at the level he was competing at eight years ago, no question about it.”
“He’s lost a step. He’s lost an ability to put powerful sentences together,” Scaramucci said, calling him a “very effective communicator” but added that “the word salad buffet on the Trump campaign is being offered at a discount. You can eat all you can eat, but it’s at a discount.”
“I don’t think anyone would ever say that Trump is the most polished speaker, but his more recent speeches do seem to be more incoherent, and he’s rambling even more so and he’s had some pretty noticeable moments of confusion,” former Trump Deputy Press Secretary Sarah Matthews told the paper.
“When he was running against Biden, maybe it didn’t stand out as much,” she said.
Trump, for his part, has rejected any notion that he has lost a step.
“I go for two hours without teleprompters, and if I say one word slightly out, they say, ‘He’s cognitively impaired,’” Trump said recently.
Matthews recalled her time in the White House, saying “There were often discussions about whether he could comprehend or understand the policy and knowing that he didn’t really have a grasp on those kinds of things.”
“No one wanted to outright say it in that environment — is he mentally fit? — but I definitely had my moments where I personally questioned it,” she added.
Several mental health experts recently told The Independent that Trump is showing signs of cognitive decline.
Clinical psychologist Dr Ben Michaelis, stressing that he has not examined Trump in person and could not offer any formal diagnosis, said the former president is “really not in a strong cognitive place.”
Michaelis, pointing to Trump’s debate against Harris last month, noted that it began at 9 p.m..
“There’s a term when you’re talking about people with dementia called sundowning, it’s a lot harder for them as the day goes on,” he said.
“It’s very difficult for them to maintain focus on a topic,” he added. “The idea of being able to maintain that level of focus for that amount of time, that late in the day…you wouldn’t think twice about it if that was your grandfather. It’s just he happens to be running for president.”
Trump campaign Communications Director Steven Cheung told The Times that Trump “has more energy and more stamina than anyone in politics, and is the smartest leader this country has ever seen.”
