White House insists Trump’s recent physical shows ‘perfectly normal’ health | Donald Trump
The White House on Monday released details of Donald Trump’s recent “full medical exam” after the president admitted Sunday evening that he had “no idea” what part of his body had been scanned for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).
Trump, the longest-serving U.S. president, underwent the procedure during a surprise “semi-annual physical” on Oct. 10 and was asked about it by reporters on Air Force One as he returned to Washington after a Thanksgiving break in Florida.
It is the latest episode of recurring concern over the cognitive abilities and mental health of the 79-year-old, who insisted he had “passed” previous tests relating to his brain functioning.
“It was just an MRI,” he said. “What part of the body? It wasn’t the brain because I took a cognitive test and I passed it.”
At midday Monday, likely in response to growing concern about Trump’s health, the White House released a memorandum from Sean Barbabella, the U.S. Navy captain who serves as the president’s physician.
He said that as part of the physical exam, Trump underwent “advanced imaging … because men in his age group benefit from a thorough assessment of their cardiovascular and abdominal health.”
Barbabella reported that: “President Trump’s cardiovascular imaging is perfectly normal. There is no evidence of arterial narrowing impairing blood flow or abnormalities in the heart or major vessels. The heart chambers are of normal size, the vessel walls appear smooth and healthy, and there is no evidence of inflammation or clotting. Overall, his cardiovascular system shows excellent health.”
Trump’s abdominal imaging, the statement said, was “also perfectly normal” and showed “no acute or chronic problems.”
A summary states that “this level of detailed evaluation is standard for a physical executive at President Trump’s age and confirms that he remains in excellent overall health.”
The report said, among other things, that cardiovascular and abdominal imaging were performed “as part of” the medical examination and did not disclose whether any other part of Trump’s body was subjected to imaging or analysis. MRI scans of the brain, spinal cord, and peripheral nervous system are common for diagnosing neurological conditions, including strokes, tumors, or degenerative conditions.
Trump had remained vague about the scan after his October visit to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, which was described by Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, at the time as a “routine annual check-up” even though he had his annual physical in April.
“I have no idea what they are analyzing, but whatever they are analyzing, they analyzed it well and they said I had the best result they have ever seen,” he said in November. “The doctor said it was the best result he had ever seen as a doctor.”
Tim Walz, Minnesota’s Democratic governor and Kamala Harris’ running mate in the 2024 election won by Trump, blasted the president during an appearance earlier Sunday on NBC’s Meet the Press.
“Has anyone in the history of the world ever been prescribed an MRI without knowing what it was for, as they say?” Walz said.
“It’s clear that the president is weakening physically. I think the mental capacity, again, rambling, you know, wildly at midnight on Thanksgiving about everything else, there’s reason for us to be concerned.”
Walz was referring to long, sweeping late-night posts by Trump on his Truth Social platform on Thursday, containing considerable anti-immigration rhetoric following the shooting of two National Guard members in Washington a day earlier.
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The suspect, an Afghan national, was admitted to the United States during the Joe Biden administration in September 2021 under a visa program for workers who had assisted the government. He was granted asylum in April, three months into the Trump administration.
Trump’s message also directed Walz with an outdated insult toward people with intellectual disabilities — and expanded on previous racially charged insults from Ilhan Omar, the Somali-born Democratic congresswoman from Minnesota.
The president returned to the subject Sunday during a meeting with reporters aboard Air Force One, repeating the unproven allegation that Omar, an outspoken critic, married her own brother to gain admission to the United States.
“If that’s true, she shouldn’t be a member of Congress and we should throw her out of our country,” Trump said.
Returning to the White House on Sunday evening, Trump returned to Truth Social to post another scathing message to a political opponent, Mark Kelly, a Democratic senator from Arizona, former astronaut and retired Navy captain. In November, the president said Kelly and other congressional Democrats engaged in “seditious conduct, punishable by death” for telling service members they were allowed to disobey illegal orders from their superiors.
According to the Daily Beast, Trump made several attempts to correct the grammar and spelling of the post which appeared to reference a law that would provide prison sentences of up to 10 years for anyone attempting to “interfere with, tamper with, influence the loyalty, morals or discipline of the military.”
The Beast published side-by-side screenshots of the messages in which Trump allegedly corrected “There are laws that impact our nation” with “There are laws that impact our nation.”
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