There was a time when an elderly president’s behavior in public set off alarm bells in his own party and across the country, leading him to drop out of his reelection campaign. Joe Biden, returning from an arduous overseas trip, appeared in a presidential debate against Donald Trump in June 2024 obviously debilitated and, weeks later, he was forced to leave the race. But Biden was a Democrat, a member of a party that expects their leader to be basically functional. After Trump’s recent performance at the NATO summit, it is clearer than ever that Republicans have no such concerns.
The president flew into Ankara, Turkey, on the new Air Force One, the fancy gift he requested from Qatar, obviously cranky and out of sorts — even after President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan greeted him like a visiting potentate, showing off a new building bearing Trump’s name. (You can’t go wrong splashing the president’s name on buildings. It’s his favorite thing. And Trump loves a dictator who treats him like a king.)
