Trump's Trials - Trump is getting a physical. What will be included in the report?

Episode Date: April 9, 2025

President Trump is getting the first physical of his second term on Friday at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. NPR's Tamara Keith has more.Support NPR and hear every episode of Trump's Terms sponsor-free with NPR+. Sign up at plus.npr.org.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

I'm Scott Detro and you're listening to Trump's terms from NPR. We're going to be doing all sorts of things nobody ever thought was even possible. It's going to be a very aggressive first hundred days of the new Congress. An unpredictable, transformative next four years. The United States is going to take off like a rocket ship. Each episode we bring you NPR's coverage of President Trump acting on his own terms. And that means sometimes doing things that no American president has tried before. NPR is covering it all in stories

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Imagine, if you will, a show from NPR that's not like NPR. A show that focuses not on the important, but the stupid, which features stories about people smuggling animals in their pants and competent criminals in ridiculous science studies, and call it Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me because the good names were taken. Listen to NPR's Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Yes, that is what it is called wherever you get your podcasts. The latest season of The White Lotus served up a tropical buffet of sex, betrayal, violence, revenge, privilege, drugs, death, and this was new, spirituality. But whose dead body

was floating in the pond? We've seen the finale and we've got Thoughts on Thoughts. Listen to the Pop Culture Happy Hour podcast from NPR. I'm Leila Faldon. President Trump is scheduled to get his annual physical exam at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on Friday. At 78 years old, Trump is the oldest president to start his second term. He follows former President Biden, who visibly slowed down while in office. NPR senior White House correspondent Tamara Keith reports. When he first ran for office in 2015, then-candidate Trump's doctor put out a statement that described his lab results as astonishingly excellent and concluded he would be the healthiest individual

ever elected to the presidency. The doctor later said Trump had dictated it to him. Then came Dr. Ronnie Jackson. Some people have just great genes. You know, I told the president that if he had a healthier diet over the last 20 years, he might live to be 200 years old. I don't know. Trump is known for his love of McDonald's

and isn't a fan of exercise. Jackson was Trump's first White House physician. In January 2018, he held court in the briefing room, answering questions at length about the president's health, including his cognitive health. I was not going to do a cognitive exam. I had no intention of doing one. The reason that we did the cognitive assessment

is plain and simple because the president asked me to do it. Jackson said Trump scored a 30 out of 30. Years later, in a Fox News interview, Trump described the test. Like you'll go person, woman, man, camera, TV. It's a very basic assessment that includes remembering a short series of unrelated words. Person, woman, man, camera, TV. They say, that's amazing. How did you do that? I do it because I have like a good memory

because I'm cognitively there. Since the end of his first term, Trump has released very little health information, just a 2023 doctor's letter without any data saying he'd lost weight and quote, his cognitive exams were exceptional. Last year, President Biden's doctors chose not to give him a cognitive exam, something Press Secretary Corrine Jean-Pierre was forced to defend repeatedly. The president himself, he said it today, he said it multiple times, and the doctor has said this,

everything that he does day in and day out as it relates to delivering for the American people is a cognitive test. Even after Biden dropped out of the race, Trump leaned in on cognitive testing as a campaign issue. We should have cognitive tests for anybody that runs for president and vice president. Trump has been known to jumble words

and during the campaign, wobbled like he might fall when getting into a garbage truck and he is acutely aware that some have raised questions about his fitness. Take this from a rally in October. I'll be a little thing and I'll say something a little bit like the I'll say the they'll say he's cognitively impaired. No I'll let you know when I will be. I will be someday.

We all will be someday. But I'll be the first to let you know. S.J. Olshansky is a professor of public health at the University of Illinois at Chicago, who has studied the health of presidents. He says there are many armchair neurologists, but a president's doctor is the only one who truly has all the necessary context.

But keep in mind medical records are private. Presidents do not have to reveal their medical records. And in fact, there is a long history of presidents concealing their health challenges. Jeff Kullman was a physician in the Clinton, Bush and Obama White Houses. He points to what happened when President Woodrow Wilson had a stroke. His second wife and his physician, a young Navy doctor, they covered up for him for several months and they were not truthful with the American people. Coleman says there's no requirement for a presidential physical but the public and media expect them now. To me, the purpose of the physical for the president

is to give him honest feedback about, here's how your heart's doing, here's how your brain function's doing. Whether that honest feedback is also shared with the public is another question entirely. Tamara Keith, NPR News. Before we wrap up, a reminder, you can find more coverage of the incoming Trump administration on the NPR Politics Podcast, where you can hear NPR's political reporters break down

the day's biggest political news with new episodes every weekday afternoon. And thanks, as always, to our NPR Plus supporters who hear every episode of the show without sponsored messages. You can learn more at plus.npr.org. I'm Scott Detro. Thanks for listening to Trump's Terms from NPR. Do you remember when discovering a new artist felt like finding buried treasure? At All Songs Considered, NPR's music recommendation podcast, we put that kind of magic back into

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