Joe Biden joked about his age, trying to sugarcoat it and saying it gave him wisdom. Unfortunately, this question keeps coming up a year before the American presidential election.
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The 80-year-old Democrat is already the oldest president in American history and would leave the White House at 86 if he were to run for a second term.
He screwed up. He stumbled, the Air Force One bridge proved particularly treacherous for the head of the White House. These incidents flooded social networks and made his Republican rivals happy.
Polls show this is a major concern for Americans, who wonder what would happen if their commander in chief was unable to carry out his duties, or worse. Concerns that confuse the political messages of the Democratic camp.
His likely rival Donald Trump is 77, just three years younger, but voters don’t seem as concerned.
In a recent ABC/Washington Post poll, 74% of respondents believe the current president is too old for a second term, compared to 50% who think the same of Donald Trump.
A leitmotif that we find in several recent polls, although the favorite of the Republican primaries, grandfather of ten grandchildren, if he wins, would become the second oldest president after Biden, seven grandchildren.
This focus on age is unfair, said S. Jay Olshansky, who studies longevity at the University of Illinois. “Getting old is not the same as before,” he told AFP.
“Wisdom”
“Large segments of the population survive into their eighth decade and are perfectly capable of being president or doing whatever they want,” he continues. “On the contrary, chronological aging is synonymous with wisdom, knowledge and experience.”
However, as political times accelerate, the captain’s age will be on everyone’s lips.
Next year, Joe Biden will have to convince people that he is in top shape by campaigning “at least five days a week,” write William Galston and Elaine Kamarck in a commentary published by the Brookings Institute.
At his last health check in February he was described as “strong”, but his gait has become noticeably more hesitant and his voice is often just a barely audible whisper.
His falls, including from a bicycle, are broadcast worldwide. In order not to stumble again, he now takes the – shorter – bridge that extends from the belly of the presidential plane.
His faux pas are talked about, such as his rambling answers about John Wayne films or when he said he wanted to lie down during a press conference.
But the outgoing president, who has always suffered from a stutter, is beginning to change his mind.
He jokingly stated several times that he was 800 years old. When he stumbled while performing on stage in Philadelphia recently, he clung to a railing for several seconds, sparking laughter from the audience.
The conflict between Israel and Hamas and in Ukraine were also an opportunity for Joe Biden to tout the benefits of half a century of foreign policy experience.
“Super seniors”
Even Donald Trump, who roughly imitates his rival, is not free from gaffes.
The ex-president declared in September that the United States was on the brink of a “Second World War” that ended in 1945, shortly after he accused Joe Biden of “cognitive deficits.”
In October, Joe Biden’s campaign team released a list of Donald Trump’s missteps, such as when he said that Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban was running Turkey.
In any case, both Biden and Trump are likely to be “super-seniors,” a term researchers use to describe people who retain their abilities very late in life, says S. Jay Olshansky.
The latter himself noted that for American presidents “biological time seems to pass more slowly” than for the rest of the population.
But Vice President Kamala Harris, 59, who is supposed to replace the head of state in the event of an accident, is also a popular target for Republicans.
She is the first woman, the first Black person and the first person of South Asian descent to hold the position, but only 35% of Americans believe she is ready to become president, according to a Yahoo/YouGov poll released in May.
At the end of the day, voters may find that age doesn’t matter.
“I never thought about age,” said Olivia Besgrove, a 23-year-old nurse from Missouri who is a Republican. “I just want someone who has a good head on their shoulders.”