Donald Trump hails ‘amazing’ memory test results as proof of his fitness to lead

Donald Trump says a ‘difficult’ memory challenge of repeating five words proves he is ‘cognitively there’ | TAKE THE TEST

President Trump said that a “difficult” memory challenge of repeating five words proved that he was “cognitively there” and had the “mental stamina” to lead the United States.

Mr Trump, 74, told Fox News that the test involved remembering the words, ideally in the same order, about 20 minutes later. He challenged Joe Biden, his Democratic rival in the November election, to do the same

“Person. Woman. Man. Camera. TV,” Mr Trump said as he explained the challenge during an interview with Marc Siegel, a doctor and Fox contributor, on Tucker Carlson Tonight, adding that listing the words in the correct order was worth “extra points”.

Mr Trump said he took the test, the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, to prove his competence. “Because I want to shut these people up. They’re fake news. They’re making up stories.”

An example of the assessment online uses the words “face, velvet, church, daisy, red”. It also shows drawings of three animals, asking the test subject to name them.

“They said nobody gets it in order, it’s actually not that easy. But for me it was easy. And that’s not an easy question,” he said. “The last questions are much more difficult.”

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During his interview Mr Trump repeatedly questioned the mental capacity of Mr Biden, 77, who has been the subject of persistent accusations from the president’s campaign that he is in “cognitive decline”.

Allies of Mr Trump have claimed that Mr Biden’s reduced acuity will be shown up in their three televised debates, beginning in late September.

“Like a memory question. It’s, like, you’ll go: ‘Person. Woman. Man. Camera. TV’, ” the president said.

“So they say, ‘Could you repeat that?’ So I said, ‘Yeah. It’s: Person. Woman. Man. Camera. TV.’ Then, ten minutes, 15, 20 minutes later they say, ‘Remember that first question … Give us that again.’ And you go: ‘Person. Woman. Man. Camera. TV.’ And they say, ‘That’s amazing. How did you do that?’

“I do it because I have, like, a good memory,” he continued. “Because I’m cognitively there.”

The president called for Mr Biden, who has a wide polling lead, to take a similar test because “something’s going on”.

He added: “You need physical stamina. You need mental stamina. We have to have somebody that’s sharp.

“If this person isn’t sharp – because I can tell you President Xi is sharp. President Putin is sharp. Erdogan is sharp – you don’t have any non-sharp people that you’re dealing with, and we can’t have somebody that’s not 100 per cent.”

The Times