A frequent target of Donald Trump took the same cognitive test that the president keeps bragging about, and came away from it with a major warning for the entire country.
Jim Acosta, the former CNN reporter Trump repeatedly attacked from the White House podium, walked through the Montreal Cognitive Assessment on his show this week. He passed it. He also said no president should ever need to take it.
The test, known as the MoCA, was administered by Dr. Rob Davidson of the Committee to Protect Healthcare. Acosta drew the cube, copied the clock, identified the lion, rhino, and camel, named the date, and worked through the serial seven subtraction. He needed a category cue to recall one word, but otherwise sailed through the screening.
Then he turned to the camera and made his point.
"This is something that the president of the United States should not be administered," Acosta said. "The president of the United States should not be taking a cognitive test ever, because we should be electing people to the office of the president of the United States where this is not an issue."
Acosta's larger point was about Trump's pattern. The president has bragged for years about acing the same test, with his repeated comments about identifying "the squirrel" becoming a running joke during his second term. According to Acosta, the fact that Trump keeps taking the test at all is the actual headline.
"If he is actually taking multiple cognitive tests, hello everybody, that is a story," Acosta said. "That is a major, major story."
Acosta also took aim at Trump's habit of bragging about the results. The MoCA is designed to detect mild cognitive impairment, not measure intelligence, and Acosta compared the appropriate response to a passing score with the way Detroit Lions running back Barry Sanders used to handle touchdowns.
"Act like you've been there before," Acosta said. "If you take a cognitive test, you get a good score, and you just kind of go back to your day."
The full episode is available on Acosta's YouTube channel.
