Why is much of the media ignoring questions about Trump’s health? | Margaret Sullivan

PBased press organizations paid special attention when, for several days recently, Donald Trump has faded from the public. In addition to certain publications on social networks and certain vague golf images, the normally omnipresent president almost seemed to disappear.

But most of the great journalism gave a pass on this subject.

Given the obvious health problems of Trump – swollen ankles, an uneven approach, deadly hands and cases of verbal confusion – the silence of the media has struck many people as hypocrisy.

“Why are the largest editorial rooms silent?” Asked John Passantino, who writes for newsletter status in the media. “No first -page writing. No broadcasting packages.” Trump’s health problems and the disappearance almost “barely recorded in traditional coverage”.

On the other hand, the media went on board with an implacable blanket of Joe Biden’s old age, but he arrived late. Almost all of this followed the appearance of shocking debate by the president of the time during his re -election campaign in 2024.

There were a lot of finger points – even a successful book by two media Bigwigs – on the failures to report the decline of Biden earlier and on the efforts of the White House to obscure it.

This time, during the Labor Day weekend, wild rumors turned on social networks that Trump had died or had undergone a debilitating stroke or a series of them. The Drudge Crudge report has published a story with this title: the President Crisis Health approaches.

However, JD Vance seemed to target the mainstream media.

“If the media you consumed told you that Donald Trump was on his deathbed because he had not made a press conference for three days, imagine what he lies else,” posted Vance on X.

This has translated, for the gullible, in the usual trash of the consumer press, a subject of regular discussion of Magaworld.

In fact, great journalism was not guilty of anything like this; If anything, they took the disappearance of Trump Also slightly.

As is often the case with Trump and his allies, there is a lot of projection.

“Imagine what else they lie to you” is something that could, much more precisely, saying about Trump and his servants on a number of subjects.

Trump also joined them. “This is false news-this is so false. This is why the media have so little credibility,” he replied to a question from Fox News which conveniently set up this series of basins to the media. (“How did you discover during the weekend that you were dead?” Asked Peter Doocy during a briefing after Trump reappeared.)

Nonsense, of course. Most consumer media were too cautious, and anything, approaching the subject.

When the New York Times did To cover the problem, the newspaper approached the subject obliquely – by focusing mainly on the false rumors of Trump’s death, then, much lower in a long history, approaching the scarcity of information on his real health. The title: President Trump is alive. Internet was convinced of the contrary.

History puts in a historical context the trend of the White House staff to obscure the physical problems of the American presidents – from the stroke of Woodrow Wilson to the chronic back pain of John F Kennedy. Finally, this argues that “the concerns and justifiable questions on the health of Mr. Trump have often been encountered by the obscure or the minimum explanations of the people around him”.

(The White House in July explained that the murderers and the swelling of Trump as a chronic venous insufficiency, but minimized the condition as benign and common for the elderly; his doctor pronounced it in excellent health.)

Even after an assassination attempt on Trump last year, no medical briefing took place. And, to my memories, there was a small follow -up of precious investigation on this subject.

However, in the midst of all this, the White House press secretary said that Trump had been “completely transparent about his health with the public, unlike his predecessor”.

As usual, in Trumpworld, a lie goes beyond the truth, and everything is Biden’s fault.

So what do The media coverage responsible for this subject looks like? The question evokes the fairy tale Goldilocks: what is too hot? What is too cold? And what’s right?

“The evaluations based on evidence of the health of a president are absolutely equitable” for journalists, said Bill Gueskin of Columbia Journalism School to Associated Press Media Reporter David Bauder.

And when someone too omnipresent in the media that Trump abandons the days? It’s also just a game.

With Trump now in his 80th Year – He was 79 years old in June – These questions do not disappear. Farm speculation is certainly not the answer, but it tends to flood when there is a vacuum of real information.

The undeniable acceptance of the comfort of the White House is not the answer either.

In good journalism, “just on the right” is based on skepticism and addressed by persistence – by obstinately digging the facts and presenting them frankly.