We all knew this would happen. After the media spent years covering for Joe Biden, pretending that his cognitive decline wasn't real, they've since spent President Trump's second term questioning his health, casting doubt about his physical and mental fitness in ways they wouldn't have dared to do while Joe Biden was in the White House.
Which brings me to Dr. Jonathan Reiner, the cardiologist who treated Dick Cheney's heart for years and has since picked up a side career as a Democrat talking head who diagnoses presidents from a TV studio. His latest production is a New York Times op-ed demanding radical transparency about the health of American political leaders, with Trump cast as the villain of the piece.
Transparency is important, and a key point of the op-ed is the blatant lack of transparency we’ve gotten about Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and his health after he was hospitalized this summer and disclosed almost nothing about his condition or his prolonged absence from the Senate. But even Republicans have been critical of the lack of transparency. We have done so here at PJ Media as well.
As for Trump, Reiner suggested, without a shred of evidence, that he is concealing serious medical problems and that his health is now a matter of national security. Trump turned 80 in June and will become the oldest man ever to hold the office upon finishing his term. Reiner pointed to bruising on Trump's hands, swollen legs, and moments of apparent drowsiness as proof the White House is hiding something, despite its repeated reassurances.
He did concede he isn't Trump's doctor and has only reviewed information already public, then noted Trump is probably the most photographed president in history, making symptoms hard to hide anyway.
Here's why Reiner doesn't get to play concerned physician now.
In February 2024, five months before Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential race, Biden's personal physician, Dr. Kevin O'Connor, declared him fit for duty. "The President feels well and this year's physical identified no new concerns," O'Connor wrote. "He continues to be fit for duty and fully executes all of his responsibilities without any exemptions or accommodations."
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Biden was 81 years old at the time, older than Trump is now, and Reiner told CNN that skipping a cognitive exam was probably the medically correct call, though he might have pushed for one anyway. "If I were the president's physician, I probably would have pushed to do it because it's going to stick out like a sore thumb when people like me read this report, with all of the concern about the patient's age and some of the other issues related to his cognitive capacity going forward," Reiner told CNN. "From a political standpoint, I probably would have urged them to report that, but that's certainly a determination made by the patient and political advisors."
Let’s translate that out of doctor-speak. Reiner wasn't worried Biden would fail a cognitive test. He was worried about the optics of skipping one.
Now let’s put this into context. Questions about Biden's mental and physical fitness didn't start in 2024. Conservative media had been documenting troubling incidents for years before he ever sought a second term. Why didn’t Reiner call for more transparency then? Why did he pretend everything was fine with Biden?
Honestly, this whole charade is exhausting.
What makes this so much worse is that we all watched something similar play out during Trump's first term too, with doctors who never examined him lining up on cable news to question his fitness because they desperately wanted to undermine Trump. And then, the same people who were claiming Trump was unfit vouched for Biden’s cognitive fitness until Biden’s debate performance forced their hand.
I don’t care about Reiner’s credentials, either. He vouched for Biden's cognitive fitness mere months before he was forced out of the presidential race. As far as I’m concerned, he isn’t being objective here. He’s playing the role he’s being paid to play. Reiner defended Biden's cognitive health when the evidence was piling up in front of all of us, clear as day. That single fact disqualifies him from diagnosing anyone else from a television studio, especially a person he's never treated. No one who defended Biden's cognitive health has any business diagnosing Trump now.
