A brain expert has given his verdict on whether Donald Trump is capable of serving another term as US president. The current occupant of the Oval Office has given mixed signals over whether he plans to seek a third term, despite the country’s constitution forbidding it. In May, Trump told NBC’s Meet the Press: “I’ll be an eight-year president, I’ll be a two-term president. I always thought that was very important.” In August, the president said he would “probably not” run for a third term. But he then told CNBC’s Squawk Box: “I’d like to run… I have the best poll numbers I’ve ever had.”
Earlier, in March, he said during an interview, also with NBC that there were methods for seeking another four years, adding that he was “not joking”. “A lot of people want me to do it,” the president said. “But, I mean, I basically tell them we have a long way to go, you know, it’s very early in the administration.”
Mr Trump is currently 79, and would be 82 in November 2028.
Dr Narinder Kapur a consultant neuropsychologist and visiting professor of neuropsychology at University College London (UCL), told the Express: “My understanding is that he couldn’t run for another term.
“He sometimes has talked about it, but I think that he will be 82 or 83 years of age if they did allow him to run for a third term now.”
He added: “But I think, at 83, Biden, as you know, would have been that age… and Biden has got significant issues now.
“So I think that, I suspect that will never arise. I would be very reluctant for someone who is 83-years-old to be running for president, for it to be in such a high office.”
Dr. Kapur also said: “I’m not going to make diagnosis of dementia on his behaviour, but I think an 83-year-old, somebody in their 80s, who will then be 87, when they finish their four year term. I think that would really be going beyond the pale.”
The specialist concluded that it would “not be acceptable”.
He did caveat, however, that some people, known as “super-agers” are aged in their 80s, but “function and behave” as if they are in their 60s or 70s.
“Trump could turn around and say, ‘well, I am one of these super-agers. I may be 83 years old, but my brain and my thinking is like a 60-year-old.’
“He’s the sort of person who may well argue that.”
Dr. Kapur added that he would be “correct in the sense that you don’t take age by itself”.
“Age is a factor,” he said, “[but] I think in terms of behaviour, I think the number of exaggerations or errors he’s made in the last few years, especially in the last six months, I would expect those are almost certainly going to increase as the time goes on.”
The specialist cited Trump mistaking Alaska for Russia before his meeting with Vladimir Putin in September as an example.
“So if he was 82 or 83 and wanted another term, I suspect the number of things he’s saying and doing would be really quite significant.
“So I don’t think he would probably be in a category of a super-age.
“But, obviously, we have to see at the time.”
The 22nd amendement to the US Constitution reads: “No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once.
“But this Article shall not apply to any person holding the office of President when this Article was proposed by the Congress, and shall not prevent any person who may be holding the office of President, or acting as President, during the term within which this Article becomes operative from holding the office of President or acting as President during the remainder of such term.”
Section two adds: “This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years from the date of its submission to the States by the Congress.”