--- title: "Doctors Say Trump Is Displaying Clear Signs of Cognitive Issues" description: "Experts are becoming increasingly worried over Trump's seemingly deteriorating mental state, Salon reports." date: "2024-03-08" modified: "2024-03-08" authors: - name: "Victor Tangermann" job_title: "Senior Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor" url: "https://futurism.com/neoscope/doctors-trump-cognitive-issues" categories: - "Health & Medicine" tags: - "dementia" - "donald trump" - "joe biden" - "mental health" --- # Doctors Say Trump Is Displaying Clear Signs of Cognitive Issues ![Experts are becoming increasingly worried over Trump's seemingly deteriorating mental state, Salon reports.]() *\Image: Win McNamee/Getty Images\* At 81 years old, president Joe Biden has attracted significant voter misgivings over his age and mental acuity. But his rival in the upcoming presidential election, Donald Trump, may be dealing with much more acute cognitive issues. Experts are becoming increasingly worried over Trump's condition, [*Salon* reports](), with the former president struggling to form coherent sentences and even [once again]() confusing Biden with his predecessor Barack Obama during a rally in North Carolina this month. "Not enough people are sounding the alarm, that based on his behavior, and in my opinion, Donald Trump is dangerously demented," psychologist and former Johns Hopkins Medical School professor John Gartner, who wrote a book about Trump's mental health, told *Salon*. "This is a tale of two brains," he added. "Biden's brain is aging. Trump's brain is dementing." "In my opinion, Donald Trump is getting worse as his cognitive state continues to degrade," Gartner said. "If Trump were your relative, you’d be thinking about assisted care right now." Others agreed. "It is meaningful because the confusion of people, in contrast to the occasional forgetting of names, is a sign of early dementia, as noted by the Dementia Care Society," licensed psychologist and founder and executive director of the Washington Center For Cognitive Therapy Vincent Greenwood told the publication. As for Trump mispronouncing words like "Venezuela" or "migrant crime," experts tend to agree he's exhibiting early signs of "paraphasia," speech disturbances caused by brain damage, and "not just aging," as Greenwood argued. And others, like clinical psychologist and Cornell University senior lecturer Harry Segal, who specializes in mental health disorders, offer a more nuanced assessment — though not one that inspires much confidence in Trump. "Since this is an intermittent problem, it suggests that when Trump is especially stressed and exhausted, he suffers cognitive slippage that affects the way he associates words or their meaning," he told *Salon*. "Note, though, that Trump’s pathological lying is itself a form of mental illness, so these cognitive lapses are literally sitting atop what appears to be an already compromised psychological functioning." And at the end of the day, Trump is still contending with [dozens of criminal charges](). Needless to say, none of this bodes well for the future of the country. **More on Trump:** *[Cash-Desperate Donald Trump Meets With Elon Musk]()* ## Author I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()