with Harris, the age argument brandished by Trump turns against him

UNITED STATES – As America prepared to choose its president between the two oldest candidates in history, Kamala Harris came to shake up the old established order. The Democratic candidate who replaced Joe Biden in the race for the White House is celebrating her sixtieth birthday this Sunday, October 20, in the final stretch of the campaign.

A birthday that counts at a time when questions of age and health occupy a predominant place in this election, going so far as to push the president-elect to throw in the towel a few months before the election due to concerns linked to his age and his cognitive faculties. Never seen before.

Except that in recent months, the strategy deployed by Donald Trump to discredit Joe Biden and his ability to govern for four more years now tends to turn against him. It’s even a last minute strategy for Kamala Harris.

“Unstable and disturbed”

By making this question an important focus of the end of the campaign, it is a curious reversal of roles that the American election reveals. Which greatly benefits the American vice-president. At the same time, Kamala Harris can afford it. Having just reached 60, she has a definite advantage compared to Joe Biden. And after helping to wipe the cast after each new blunder from the president in the campaign, it is she who openly attacks Donald Trump on his cognitive abilities. He who attacked Sleepy Joe » at the slightest misstep.

Latest example? During a meeting in Pennsylvania on Wednesday October 16. She thus estimated that Donald Trump was becoming “increasingly unstable and disturbed” at the moment when the latter continues confusing and random outings.

Kamala Harris is quite legitimate on this point: Donald Trump is only four years younger than Joe Biden. And in the event of victory on November 5, he will become the oldest American president to take the oath of office, beating by a few months the record established in January 2021 by… Joe Biden.

For the Democrats, any argument is therefore worth taking to reverse the roles and make Trump the senile old man he said he saw in Joe Biden a few months earlier. Even Bill Clinton is getting into it. At the Democratic Party convention this summer, the former US head of state from 1993 to 2001 remarked that he was “ still younger than Donald Trump “. The two men being 66 days apart.

Opaque medical records

Kamala Harris can also count on her own health. She also used her glowing health report, made public by the White House at the beginning of October. He states that the candidate, in “ excellent health », has “the physical and mental resistance necessary to fulfill the duties of the presidency” of the United States.

Statements that contrast with the opacity surrounding the health of his rival. Kamala Harris herself judged that her senior, 19 years old, was “ unfit to exercise this mandate “. It must be said that the latest details on Donald Trump’s health were based on a letter from his personal doctor reporting normal physical examination results and cognitive test results. “exceptional”. Except that these results already date from September 2023. What the New York Times took the liberty of recalling in a recent investigation into the lack of transparency surrounding its medical files.

Fiercely pinpointing every disjointed digression by Donald Trump in recent weeks, Kamala Harris once again stood out during a curious scene involving Donald Trump’s behavior during a question-and-answer session with Pennsylvania voters in mid- october.

On stage, the Republican interrupted the meeting (without ever resuming it) to listen to songs he likes, offering lunar images of himself, motionless for long minutes. “I hope he is well”Kamala Harris allowed herself to comment ironically. “Trump seems lost, confused and frozen on stage”had previously commented on the Democrat’s campaign team.

Occupy space, at all costs

After having openly campaigned for the withdrawal of Biden, the New York Times pointed out in an article published in September that Donald Trump also has a tendency to lose himself with the weight of the years. A chain of confusions, unfinished sentences and haphazard explanations, now parodied and mocked by the democratic camp.

But as age is not considered an important subject by Donald Trump’s voters, he benefits from being in sufficient physical shape to hold rallies across the country. Which is reminiscent of his 2020 campaign when he used this strategy to bypass possible criticism of his age. This is what University of Iowa law professor Derek T. Muller pointed out at the time in an interview for France Culture. “ Donald Trump put in place a sort of “staging” during the campaign which projects an image of physical health. Even when he was sick with coronavirus, in a few days, he held meetings constantly (…) as if the virus did not affect him », he explained

Four years later, a similar observation can be made for the 2024 campaign, after the assassination attempts of which he was the victim. To the point of having a more sustained rhythm than that of Kamala Harris. A frantic pace which allows him to occupy the space. At the risk of saturation… in theory.

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