Donald Trump had a fairly ironic – and perhaps telling – memory lapse.
Talking with New York Magazine, Trump said that his father, Fred Trump, had no health problems except for one.
“He had one problem,” Trump said. “At a certain age, about 86, 87, he started getting, what do they call it?”
According to the reporter, Ben Terris, Trump pointed to his forehead and looked towards White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt.
“Alzheimer’s,” she said.
“Like an Alzheimer’s thing,” Trump continued. “Well, I don’t have it.”
Terris then asked Trump if Alzheimer’s is a topic that’s on his mind.
“No, I don’t think about it at all. You know why?” he said. “Because whatever it is, my attitude is whatever.”
Terris also talked to Trump’s clinical psychologist niece, Mary Trump, who described watching her grandfather – Donald Trump’s father – succumb to the disease. She said that the symptoms started slowly and then advanced quickly.
“One of the first times I noticed it was at some event where he was being honored,” she said. “And I looked at him and saw this deer-in-the-headlights look, like he had no idea where he was.”
She said that she sees the same thing happening to her uncle.
“Sometimes it does not seem like he’s oriented to time and place,” she said. “And on occasion, I do see that deer-in-the-headlights look.”