President Donald Trump set off another round of speculation about his mental health by mixing up his father's birthplace.
The 79-year-old president hosted German Chancellor Friedrich Merz on Tuesday at the White House, where he took questions about the U.S. attack on Iran and seemingly mixed up his U.S.-born father, who died in 1999, with his German-born grandfather, who died decades before Trump's birth.
"My father was born -- he knows all about my father -- my father was born there," Trump said. "These are places you automatically feel warmly about."
Frederick Trump was born in 1869 in Bavaria and first came to the U.S. in 1885 and was eventually stripped of his German citizenship for failing to complete mandatory military service, and he died in the 1918 flu pandemic after returning to the U.S. and buying up real estate in Queens.
His son Fred Trump, the president's father, was born in the Bronx in 1905 and took over the real estate business that had been started by his parents, and which eventually became the Trump Organization.
Recent polling found six in 10 Americans, including 30 percent of Republicans, believe the president has become erratic with age, and the Oval Office slip-up did nothing to allay those concerns.
"Trump, suffering from dementia, is confused about where his father was born," posted veteran newspaper editor Mark Jacob. "It was in the Bronx, not in Germany. Trump's grandfather was an immigrant who came here after getting kicked out of Germany for evading the draft."
"This is called dementia," agreed Bluesky user Christian Harrup.
"Dementia. His father was born in America," added law professor Jen Taub.
"Imagine if Biden didn’t know where his father was born and confused his father with grandfather," sighed Bluesky user EricaJones. "This bozo does it and MAGA giggles."
"Frederick Trump immigrated to the US in 1885 when he was 16 partly to avoid Bavaria's mandatory service requirement and then later moved to the Yukon and established a restaurant/brothel," noted Bluesky user Amanda Montagne. "He returned to Bavaria in 1901, only to be banished four years later for having avoided conscription."
"When are we going to start addressing Trump’s cognitive decline," wondered X user Vince Wilson.