Age of concern in US: President Biden is 81 and wants to run again

Age isn't just a number when you are the US president, the most powerful person in the world. Apart from the experience that comes with the number, age can be weaponised against you.

That's exactly what Joe Biden is experiencing.

In the middle of the APEC meeting last week, US President Joe Biden got up from his chair, walked, as if in a daze, towards Chinese President Xi Jinping and shook his hands. Xi was visibly stunned.

That wasn't the only part where Biden went off the script during Xi's visit, his first to the United States in six years.

A video of Antony Blinken, the US Secretary of State, wincing and shaking his head after President Biden called Xi a "dictator" has gone viral. Blinken's reaction revealed that Biden's remark wasn't on the expected lines.

The two recent incidents reveal what Americans are discussing and worrying about -- President Joe Biden's age.

Biden turned 81 on Monday.

He is the oldest-serving US President. And that's not all. Biden is running for the White House in the US Presidential election to be held in 2024.

Although Biden's doctor declared him healthy and "fit for duty" in February 2023, opinion polls show that a majority of Americans have concerns about Biden's age.

BIDEN THE 'GAFFE MACHINE'

Biden has been involved in regular gaffes, so much so that Biden humorously referred to himself as the ‘gaffe machine’.

The US President usually says the wrong things at the wrong time, following which his administration has to issue clarifications.

On November 13, Biden referred to US Vice-President Kamala Harris as “President Harris”.

"President Harris is here to make sure we do it the right way," Biden said during a sports event. Well, this wasn't the first time that Biden referred to his second-in-command as “President Harris”. He has done so on six other occasions and once he even referred to Kamla Harris as the “first lady”.

At times, Biden's remarks have put his administration in a tight spot.

Commenting on the terrorist attack by Hamas in Israel, Biden said on October 12, "This attack was a campaign of brutal cruelty and I never really thought I would confirm pictures of terrorists beheading children."

A White House spokesperson and other US officials had to clarify later that Biden did not independently see such pictures or confirm such reports. The US President's remarks were based on media reports and claims made by Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu's spokesperson, the White House said.

Similarly, Biden said on June 29 that Russian President Vladimir Putin was "losing the war in Iraq" when he meant to say Ukraine.

Biden's gaffes are not only limited to his comments on international affairs. In July last year, people were shocked when a video of Biden surfaced, in which he claimed that he had cancer.

A White House official had to again come to the rescue and confirmed that Biden was referring to his past removal of skin cancer and had mistakenly used the present tense in his statement, according to a Fox News report.

BIDEN'S AGE A CONCERN FOR VOTERS

President Joe Biden's doctor declared him healthy and "fit for duty" in February 2023 after a physical examination. But opinion polls show that a majority of Americans have concerns about his age.

In a mid-September Reuters/Ipsos poll, voters expressed concern over Biden’s age and his fitness for office.

Seventy-seven percent of respondents, including 65% of Democrats, said Biden was too old to be president, while just 39% said Biden was mentally sharp enough for the presidency. By comparison, 56% of poll respondents said Trump was too old for the office, while 54% said he was mentally sharp enough to handle the challenges of the presidency.

That wasn't the only poll to show Americans' concern over Biden's age.

About 74% of respondents said Biden was too old to run for a second term in a survey conducted in September by ABC News and the Washington Post.

That number represented a 6% increase since May, a month after Biden launched his second White House bid.

Biden is the ninth oldest national leader in the world, according to a Pew Research Center analysis released in March.

The record for the oldest global leader is currently held by 90-year-old President Paul Blya of Cameroon.

Republican frontrunner and former President Donald Trump is younger than Biden. "But at 76, Trump would be among the 25 oldest world leaders when compared with those currently in power," according to the Pew Research analysis, which studied the age of sitting heads of government in 187 member states of the United Nations.

If Biden is re-elected to the Oval Office, he would be 82 when he starts and 86 by the end of his second term in office.

Before Biden, it was Ronald Reagan, a Republican, who ended his second stint at the Oval Office at the age of 77 in 1989.

AGEISM VS POLITICAL LIABILITY

There are TV debates on whether Biden's age is a "political liability", with experts agreeing that he is cognitively impaired.

On the other hand, experts also say that harping on Biden's age rather than his experience borders on ageism.

"What we're going to continue to talk about is the record that this president has had. It's been a historic record," White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in September, countering repeated questions on Biden's age.

Other than the gaffes, Biden's stiff gait is unmissable.

On June 1, Biden slipped and fell on stage while taking part in the Air Force Academy graduation ceremony in Colorado Springs. The video of the President’s tumble, when he was getting off the stage after handing out diplomas, went viral on social media. He was quickly helped back to his feet by Secret Service agents and an Air Force officer, according to ABC News.

The Democratic Party, which Biden belongs to, are well aware of Biden's age factor.

The latest opinion polls on Monday revealed that Trump had edged past Biden. Though within the margin of error, it is significant.

"I know I'm 198 years old," Biden joked in June.

But will voters allow Biden to have the last laugh? America and the world will know in 2024.