Biden should've been given multiple cognitive tests while in the White House, Obama's doctor says
WASHINGTON — Joe Biden's doctor should've made him undergo multiple neurocognitive tests during his presidency, former President Barack Obama's physician told The Post.
Jeffrey Kuhlman, who served as Obama's doctor from 2009 to 2013, highlighted in a phone interview Saturday how Biden — and all politicians over the age of 70 — should be submitted to 'a few hours' of annual mental exams and release those results to the public.
'My position is that a 78-year-old candidate, Trump at the time, an 82-year-old president [Biden] would both benefit from neurocognitive testing,' said Kuhlman, who published a book 'Transforming Presidential Healthcare,' recommending that in November 2024.
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'Any politician over the age of 70 has normal age-related cognitive decline,' Kuhlman said, pointing out that he's been making the recommendation for nearly a year — and did so in a New York Times op-ed on the day Biden bowed out of the 2024 race.
'If you look at his three physicals that were released as president, Dr. [Kevin] O'Connor wrote five to six pages, single-spaced. He referenced 10 to 20 specialist physicians.'
5 Joe Biden's doctor should've made him undergo multiple neurocognitive tests during his presidency, former President Barack Obama's physician told The Post.
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But the tests did not include any neurocognitive work, nor did Biden submit to the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, as Trump did in his first term, a two-minute screening comprising around 30 questions to test for signs of dementia, according to Obama's ex-physician.
'I have no doubt that President Trump aced it,' he said of the test, but said the current White House, in the interest of full transparency, should also release CT scans that were taken after the assassination attempt against the Republican candidate in Butler, Pa., last July.
Kuhlman added the Montreal Cognitive Assessment isn't adequate to determine more serious mental slippage, one of the three main areas that medical professionals should be considering when evaluating the president, along with cancer and cardiovascular issues.
Memory, reasoning, speed of processing and spacial visualization all begin to decline around the age of 60, he also said.
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5 Kevin O'Connor served as Biden's doctor during his vice presidency, overlapping with Kuhlman in the White House medical unit.
David Lienemann/The White House
O'Connor served as Biden's doctor during his vice presidency, overlapping with Kuhlman in the White House medical unit.
Kuhlman said he 'respects' O'Connor's 'medical judgment,' but also told The Washington Post: 'Sometimes those closest to the tree miss the forest.'
In apparently his only media interview during Biden's term, O'Connor insisted to The Post in July 2024 that the president's cognitive health was 'excellent' — days after being forced out of a re-election bid and replaced by Vice President Kamala Harris due to a dismal debate performance June 27.
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5 Kuhlman said he 'respects' O'Connor's 'medical judgment,' but also told The Washington Post: 'Sometimes those closest to the tree miss the forest.'
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In a break from his predecessors, Biden's doctor never answered questions from the press in the White House briefing room but submitted annual physical reports that noted some physical ailments without addressing the president's mental acuity, other than to say he was 'fit for duty.'
'The president doesn't need a cognitive test,' claimed White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre in a February 2024 briefing following what would be Biden's final physical as commander-in-chief. 'He passes a cognitive test every day.'
White House visitor logs show the oldest-ever president did submit to evaluation from an expert in Parkinson's disease and 20-year veteran of Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, Dr. Kevin Cannard, but O'Connor said the January 2024 meeting was part of Biden's annual physical.
'If somebody turns up a report that Kevin Cannard said he has Parkinson's,' said Kuhlman, 'then that's a completely different story, but we have 14 years of Kevin Cannard evaluating him and that's who I would trust.'
5 O'Connor said that was part of his annual physical and ruled out a Parkinson's diagnosis, though other doctors expressed skepticism.
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O'Connor said that was part of his annual physical and ruled out a Parkinson's diagnosis, though other doctors expressed skepticism.
'I could've diagnosed him from across the Mall,' neurologist Dr. Tom Pitts told NBC in July 2024, pointing to Biden's 'rigidity,' 'shuffling gait' and 'slow movement.'
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Special Counsel Robert Hur, who determined that Biden 'willfully' hoarded classified documents after leaving the Obama White House, chose not to bring charges months earlier that year in February, in part because a jury would view the president as a 'sympathetic, well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory.'
The Republican-led House Oversight Committee subpoenaed O'Connor on Thursday to appear for questioning about the former president's mental abilities on June 27.
5 The Republican-led House Oversight Committee subpoenaed O'Connor on Thursday to appear for questioning about the former president's mental abilities on June 27.
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Oversight Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) in a cover letter accompanying the subpoena suggested the doctor's past 'financial relationship with the Biden family' may have 'contributed to an effort to hide former President Biden's fitness to serve from the American people.'
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Jean-Pierre, who left the Democratic Party and is publishing a tell-all book about the 'broken' Biden administration, is also expected to be hauled in for testimony.
Days before a book was set to be published alleging a vast cover-up of his decline during his last two years in the White House, Biden announced that he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer that had spread to his bones.
The book, 'Original Sin,' notes that O'Connor was reluctant to administer a cognitive test, according to co-authors Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson.
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Kuhlman said O'Connor had conducted tests for that kind of cancer between 2009 and 2014 when they served together in the White House, but it may not have been 'worth doing in the next 10 years' based on the findings of that final exam, known as a PSA, in the vice presidency.
'I hope that Kevin O'Connor had that conversation every year with his patient, Joe Biden, and documented that in the medical record,' he said. 'If he did the PSA and chose not to release it, I don't agree with that.'
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