President Joe Biden needs to undergo a mental and physical health check after his condition has clearly deteriorated over the past year, an exclusive poll by DailyMail.com found a majority of likely voters.
A whopping seven in 10 respondents said the president should take a cognitive test, after the 81-year-old left voters, politicians and pundits mostly concerned about his disastrous presidential debate in Atlanta against Donald Trump.
The poll of 1,000 likely voters, conducted days after the debate, also found that 70 percent said Biden should undergo another general physical.
Biden blamed his poor performance last week in part on a cold, which the White House said he contracted during his international trip 19 days ago.
There are big questions about the commander in chief’s health, which has led to a series of meetings among Democrats worried about their prospects in November, as well as discussions about whether Biden should be replaced as party leader.
More than 70 percent of likely voters believe President Joe Biden should take a cognitive test, an exclusive DailyMail.com poll conducted after the debate found
The White House, seemingly trying to make up for the president’s comments, finally confirmed on Thursday that Biden had visited a doctor after his halting debate performance. However, it claimed it was only to check whether Biden had a cold, which advisers said was the cause of his hoarse voice during the CNN event.
“A few days later, the president was seen to check for a cold and he was recovering well,” White House spokesman Andrew Bates told DailyMail.com on July 4, although there is no indication he underwent a more extensive battery of tests.
The announcement of the health check was a reversal of an earlier claim made by White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre just a day earlier, when asked by DailyMail.com whether he had seen a doctor about a persistent cold Wednesday.
She then said that Biden had not been to a doctor since his illness lasted several weeks.
He “still has a lingering cold,” she said repeatedly during the nearly hour-long briefing, which focused almost entirely on questions about Biden’s ability to seek re-election.
She also said that apart from the recent check, the octogenarian president has not undergone a medical exam since his annual medical examination in February.
Biden’s physician, Dr. Kevin O’Connor, is traveling with him. He was seen by reporters at the president’s villa in Italy last month. O’Connor also traveled with Biden to the debate in Atlanta.
Immediately after the debate, Democrats began expressing concerns about Biden’s age and sharpness
The Montreal Cognitive Assessment (above) is widely used to assess patients with neurodegenerative diseases
In addition, an exclusive poll by DailyMail.com found that 60 percent of likely voters believe the president’s health has deteriorated significantly since the beginning of the year.
Of the 1,000 likely voters, only 18 percent disagreed with the statement that things have gotten worse for him.
The poll found that 55 percent believe Biden has declined in the past month.
“The only option for the White House now – if they want Biden to stay – is complete transparency,” said pollster James Johnson, who conducted the Mail’s survey.
“If Biden really doesn’t have an age problem, then they need to show everything they can to convince voters of that, including medical tests.”
“But even then, it appears voters have already decided that Biden is not fit to govern,” he added.
A majority of likely voters said Joe Biden’s health has noticeably deteriorated over the past year and month
The widespread panic over the president’s fitness after the debate was compounded by a flood of video content online showing a struggling Biden.
Two in three voters told the Daily Mail they have seen embarrassing social media videos of Joe.
In those videos, Biden can be seen stumbling, looking confused and/or slurring his words.
In a widely circulated clip, the president was seen walking away while looking up at the sky during a D-Day ceremony in France.
Another clip shows the president wide-eyed and motionless as he attends a Juneteenth ceremony with his dancing vice president and other White House guests.
Such videos are seen as hostile to the president, with Jean-Pierre even calling them misleadingly edited “cheap fakes.”
Earlier this week, former White House medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci declined to comment when asked if he had concerns about Biden’s condition during the debate.
“You know, I can’t say that,” he said in an interview with CBS.
“I don’t think it’s appropriate to say that, Major, because if you just look at someone once, you just don’t know what can happen,” Fauci said.
However, the doctor did suggest that antihistamines, which are used to treat colds and flu, may have contributed to Biden’s drowsy performance.
“Did he have a bad cold? Did he take an antihistamine to make him drowsy or something? We don’t know what happened,” Fauci continued.
Despite concerns about his cognitive and physical health and his poor performance during debates, Democrats who have spoken to the president in recent days have formed a united front in support of the aging Biden.
A group of Democratic governors from across the country met with Biden on Wednesday night to voice their concerns about him and hear why he should remain at the top of the party’s ticket.
Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the current head of the Democratic Governors Association, and New York Gov. Kathy Hochul were tasked with addressing the press following the meeting scheduled after Biden’s debate debacle.
“We always believe that if you love someone, you should tell them the truth,” Moore said.
“We know we have work to do,” he added. “We know that as we stand here, we are behind.”
“But we also know that the path we are on to make sure we make progress in November is real.”
“The president kept telling us and showing us that he was going to go all the way,” the Marylander continued. “That’s when we said we were going to support him.”