It might be considered ageist, as Rep. Eric Swalwell learned to his detriment, but the truth is that Joe Biden is 76 years old, with two brain aneurysms under his belt, and so voters will naturally have some questions about his overall health. So far, his brain seems to be working just fine, producing a steady, regular stream of verbal blunders and gaffes as it’s done for the majority of his career. (Years ago, Biden jokingly blamed his first aneurysm for his frequent foot-in-mouthing: “It could’ve saved us all a lot of trouble [had I known], you know what I mean?”) But given the occasional mental hiccup during the debates, and ongoing, specious attacks from his more dotardly counterpart, Donald Trump, pundits cannot help but offer armchair diagnoses. “I would look at his résumé for maybe 30 seconds and reach one obvious conclusion: remarkable qualifications, too old,” Kurtis Meyer, the Democratic chairman of Mitchell County, Iowa, delicately suggested to the Times earlier this month. “He’s pressing against Father Time, who is a very tough competitor.”
So of course, Politico consulted the ultimate authority on Biden’s brain: the neurosurgeon who popped his skull open, examined it, and operated following his two aneurysms in 1988. “He is every bit as sharp as he was 31 years ago. I haven’t seen any change,” said Dr. Neal Kassell, now teaching neurosurgery at the University of Virginia. “I can tell you with absolute certainty that he had no brain damage, either from the hemorrhage or from the operations that he had. There was no damage whatsoever.”
For everyone else who hasn’t seen Biden’s brain, speculating on his mental acuity would be “inappropriate,” warned Emily Rogalski, a Northwestern University neuroscientist who specializes in aging. “It’s difficult to comment specifically on any one individual’s cognitive status without knowing more deeply about their medical history.”
Biden isn’t the only 2020 candidate facing scrutiny over their age: Bernie Sanders is 77, Elizabeth Warren is 70, and Trump is 73. (The sitting president’s mental health remains an open question among non-medical professionals, debated by everyone from Walter Mondale to Kim Jong Un.) Might any one of them start exhibiting signs of dementia? Could they possibly die in office? For Kassell, at least, the choice is obvious. “I am going to vote for the candidate who I am absolutely certain has a brain that is functioning. And that narrows it down exactly to one.”
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