“It is our professional opinion, based on past and ongoing assessments, that the mental state of donald trump has deteriorated even further since our 2024 declaration,” begins the letter that a group of doctors and health researchers delivered to the US Congress United States on April 30 this year.
Professionals state that they have an ethical duty to “alert to the fact that the US president represents a growing danger to the population.” The document was signed by psychiatrists, neurologists, psychologists and specialists in public and mental health linked to prestigious universities, such as Harvard, Columbia and George Washington.
The text is another chapter in a long discussion in the USA that covers not only the Donald Trump’s governing capacitypresident who turns 80 this Sunday (14), but also the age of leaders of the country as a whole.
It is not new that sectors of American society question the mental health of Trump. In 2024, a collective calling itself the “Anti-Psychopath Political Action Committee”, published an open letter in The New York Times.
The text said that the then presidential candidate showed symptoms of “a serious and intractable personality disorder — malignant narcissism.” The Republican would be “manifestly unfit to exercise leadership”, stated the full-page ad signed by 200 doctors.
Speculation about Trump’s health occurred in the context of the withdrawal of Joe Biden of the race for the White House in 2024. The Democrat, then president of the United States, abandoned the race after months of questions about his physical and cognitive condition. At 82 years old, Biden was the oldest president in the country’s history and was frequently the target of attacks by the Republican leader, who nicknamed him “Sleepy Joe” in an attempt to associate him with fragility and loss of vigor.
Although the criticisms were driven by the Republican opposition, they also began to echo within the Democratic Party itself. After a considered performance confused and wavering in the first debate against TrumpBiden began to face increasing pressure from leaders of his own party to abandon the presidential race — a decision he would end up taking about a month later.
During this period, Trump’s 2024 campaign projected the Republican as a man in full physical and mental condition, in opposition to his rival. Now, in his second termthe current president began to face questions similar to those that had been directed at Biden.
The health experts’ statement to Congress points to a “marked deterioration in cognitive functioning, evidenced by disorganized and tangential speech, long-winded digressions, factual confusion, and sudden and unexplained changes of direction on strategic issues.” It also mentions episodes of “apparent drowsiness during public procedures of great importance”.
In November 2025, a photo of the president with his eyes closed at an event at the White House led California governor, Democrat Gavin Newsom, to call him “Dozy Don”, or “Sleepy Don”, on social media.
In April of this year, manipulated photos of a meeting between high-ranking members of the government, including Health Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr., showed Trump sleeping with his head lolling to the side. The false image was shared on networks, giving fuel to calls for the use of the 25th amendment to the American Constitution.
The amendment allows the vice president or a majority of members of the government or Congress to remove the president from office if he is considered unfit to perform the role.
Speeches calling for the use of the amendment against Trump have been appearing among Democratic opponents and also among former allies of the Republican. It is mentioned, for example, both in the letter from health experts — who declare that they are non-partisan and say that the text is not political, but technical — and by the former federal deputy Marjorie Taylor Greene.
Taylor Greene, of the Republican Party, broke with the president in November 2025 after conflicts over the White House’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein scandal. She resigned from her mandate and has been criticizing the management on social media and in the press.
She told CNN that Trump’s speech about “eliminating a civilization”, aimed at Iranit was insanity, “not harsh rhetoric.”
The White House has dismissed speculation that Trump is experiencing mental health problems. Regarding the images circulating on social media showing the president with his eyes closed, apparently dozing at public events, the government claims that the photographs were taken at the moment he was blinking.
In late May, the White House also released a report from the president’s physician, Sean Barbabella, who stated that Trump “remains in excellent health, with good cardiac, pulmonary and neurological function, as well as excellent overall physical condition.”
