(Bloomberg) -- President Joe Biden said he is undergoing a physical, a regular check-up during an election season in which voters have expressed concerns about his age and fitness to serve a second term.
“I’m going to Walter Reed to get my physical,” Biden told reporters as he left the White House Wednesday morning, referring to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Maryland.
At 81, Biden is already the oldest president in US history as he seeks reelection in November, with a likely rematch against former President Donald Trump, who is 77. Both cruised to victory in their parties’ Michigan primary elections Tuesday.
The White House described the appointment as “a routine annual physical” and said a written summary of the results would be released later Wednesday.
The president has faced growing questions about his physical and mental health in the last year, intensified by a special counsel report questioning his memory, a series of incidents in which he mixed up the names of world leaders, and the news that he uses a continuous positive airway pressure, or CPAP, device to treat sleep apnea.
Biden has aggressively parried questions about his mental fitness, saying in an appearance on NBC’s broadcast early Tuesday that Trump often misspeaks and that what matters is the policies each aims to implement.
“It’s about how old your ideas are,” Biden said.
After the president’s physical last February, his longtime physician Kevin O’Connor said Biden was “healthy,” “vigorous,” and fit to execute his presidential duties.
Still, that exam did little to dissuade Republican attacks over his age or voter unease. An NBC News poll taken in January showed three-quarters of voters, including half of Democrats, say they have concerns about his age. Less than half harbor such worries about Trump, even though the Republican is only four years younger.
‘Elderly Man’
The issue of Biden’s age received more scrutiny after Special Counsel Robert Hur’s report into the president’s handling of classified documents, which described him as a “sympathetic, well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory.” One of the most startling claims in the report was that Biden did not remember the timeframe for when his son Beau died.
The president reacted angrily to that assertion in conversations with House Democrats and in an impromptu prime time press conference where he insisted his “memory is fine.”
Yet he undermined his case at the press conference by referring to Egypt’s president as the leader of Mexico.
Biden’s aides have argued that Hur was unqualified to assess the president’s mental faculties and that he violated Justice Department standards in doing so. Biden assailed Hur for saying he did not remember when his son died.
“How in the hell dare he raise that,” Biden said. “I don’t need anyone to remind me of when he passed away.”
The White House disclosed in June — after it was reported by Bloomberg News — that Biden had started using a CPAP machine to treat sleep apnea but said he was not suffering from broader health problems.
Biden has often sought to dismiss questions about his age with humor, including after he tripped on a sandbag during June’s US Air Force Academy commencement ceremony.
“I got sandbagged,” Biden later joked with reporters.
(Updates with Michigan primary results and additional background starting in 3rd paragraph)
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