Dr. Ronny Jackson, the former White House physician now running for Congress as a Trump-boosting Republican, showed up on Fox News on Monday night for the sole purpose of backing President Donald Trump’s baseless accusation that Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden is taking secret memory-enhancing drugs to assist his debate performance.
Over the past year, Fox News host Sean Hannity—an informal adviser and close confidant of Trump’s—has been at the forefront of conservative media’s portrayal of Biden as a senile gaffe-machine suffering from severe cognitive decline. The president has latched onto this line of attack, describing the former vice president as “Sleepy Joe” while regularly claiming Biden doesn’t possess the mental fitness for office.
With the first presidential debate approaching, however, the president has started to reset expectations for the ex-veep’s performance. Over the past several weeks, Trump has suddenly begun accusing Biden of taking some mysterious performance-enhancing drug that can boost his memory and cognitive abilities, calling for Biden to be drug-tested before Tuesday’s debate.
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During Monday’s broadcast of Hannity’s primetime Fox News program, the host spent the majority of his opening monologue discussing the upcoming debate while replaying his attacks on Biden’s mental acuity and cognitive abilities. At the same time, Hannity suggested the presidential hopeful could have a good debate performance because he’s been preparing “all summer.”
Hannity then turned to Jackson, the former White House doctor who once said Trump could live to 200 if he changed his diet because he has “good genes,” to openly speculate about whether Biden is on a memory-assisting PED.
“The president has been asking, ‘Is he taking any medicines?’ That would be medical transparency,” Hannity noted, adding: “Why do you think the media is giving him a pass and allowing him not to answer questions and hiding in his basement and, I would argue, probably preparing all summer for the debate?”
Jackson, who also served as the White House physician during the Obama administration, claimed the media is “trying to cover” for Biden before making an armchair diagnosis of the former veep.
“But something’s going on with this man at this point,” Jackson said. “They keep him locked away for 97 percent of the time and then they have a little window where they think he might be able to put a few sentences together and they break him out and have him read from the teleprompter.”
After asserting that Biden is being provided “scripted questions” from reporters, Jackson then claimed that it was “reasonable” for the president to “ask to see if he’s being medicated because he’s had a few times where he’s come out and looked a little bit more energetic than he’s typically looked over the past few months.”
Adding that Biden’s had “good days and bad days,” which is how “cognitive decline usually happens,” the doctor once again suggested that Biden is taking some mysterious drug to help him appear more lucid.
“But I think it’s completely reasonable to ask if he’s taking medications to help him with his alertness and his memory,” he continued. “They certainly would be asking Donald Trump that.”
The ex-White House physician concluded by claiming the press had been “relentless” and “wanted all the answers” when Jackson oversaw Trump’s cognitive tests, while now “the press does not care” when it comes to Biden.
Jackson did not elaborate on what type of miracle medications Biden could be taking that could possibly reverse the Dem nominee’s supposed dementia-based decline. Paradoxically, allegations of pill-pushing and drinking on the job derailed Jackson’s nomination to head the Department of Veteran Affairs.
The former Trump doctor isn’t the only physician Fox News’ primetime hosts have trotted out in an effort to lend credence to Trump’s conspiracy theory. Last week, Tucker Carlson brought on Fox News medical contributor Dr. Marc Siegel to wildly speculate that Biden is using speed and Adderall, claiming that both drugs could “help in low doses for short periods of time.”
