Fox News, Fox Business, and other right-wing media outlets have repeatedly attacked President Joe Biden for his age, often conflating his speech impediment with mental decline. But those outlets haven't applied that amount of scrutiny to 2024 GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump.
CNN, however, has aired a supercut video contrasting Trump in 2016 to Trump during his September 10, 2024 debate with Vice President Kamala Harris — a video that The New Republic's Hafiz Rashid describes as a "stark example of the convicted felon’s cognitive decline."
Before airing the video, CNN's Abby Phillip explained, "We compared his debate answers back in 2016 to the ones that he gave this week."
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For example, the video compares Trump's answers on immigration in 2016 to his answers on immigration eight years later during the debate with Harris. And this time, Phillip notes, Trump "veers off topic several times."
Rashid says of the video, "The video comparison, aired on Thursday night, shows how Trump would stay on topic and give coherent answers in 2016. In contrast, Trump earlier this week went off on tangents, rambling and avoiding specific ideas."
Rashid adds, "In particular, on immigration, in 2016 Trump was able to hammer home his points about building a wall and stopping drugs from entering the country. On Tuesday, Trump ranted about the false rumor of Haitian immigrants eating pets in Ohio and a disproven story about a Venezuelan gang taking over an apartment complex in Colorado."
dWhile Phillip was describing the video, the following words appeared on the screen: "Is there a double standard over Trump's mental acuity?" — an obvious reference to all the attention Biden's age has received.
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