President Joe Biden refused on Friday to take a cognitive test that would help demonstrate his mental acuity, telling ABC’s George Stephanopoulos that the job of the presidency already serves as one. “Every day I have that test,” Biden insisted. “Everything I do. You know, not only am I campaigning, but I’m running the world. Not–and that’s not hi–sounds like hyperbole, but we are the essential nation of the world,” he said. “I’m workin’ on what we were doin’ with regard to–in Europe with regard to expansion of NATO and whether it’s gonna stick. I’m takin’ on Putin. I mean, every day there’s no day I go through there not those decisions I have to make every single day.” Biden says he has ongoing physicals and other examinations and that doctors have maintained he was in good physical health. “No one said I had to. No one said. They [doctors] said I’m good,” he said. When asked pointedly if he has the mental and physical capacity to do it for another four years, Biden said, “I believe so, I wouldn’t be runnin’ if I didn’t think I did.” The president used the 22-minute interview to claim that, despite a debate performance he said was a “bad episode,” he was still the “most qualified person” to defeat Donald Trump.
