Donald Trump's age became the most critical issue in the White House race on Sunday after President Joe Biden withdrew from the contest and passed the torch to Vice-President Kamala Harris as a substitute candidate who's chief asset will be the fact that she's nearly 20 years younger than the GOP nominee.
Republicans who've portrayed Biden as unqualified on the grounds of senility can expect a massive dose of their own medicine for the next three months in a race that will pit a Democrat who's 59 against a former president who's 78. Trump would turn 80 midway through the second year of a second term if he prevails in November. Trump would be as old as Biden is now before the term that he's seeking now came to end.
What's worse for the Republicans is the fact that Trump showed more signs of aging in his speech last week to the GOP's national convention than he had at any point in the past.
Trump mumbled incoherently at times in a speech that had some delegates dozing Milwaukee before it ended after midnight in the eastern U.S.
The former president's grip on reality seemed far more tenuous during the performance at the RNC than it had in the past. Trump had fact-checkers working overtime as a result of countless false statements that he served up to the party faithful on Thursday night. Trump appeared to be considerably older on the stage last week than Biden ever did in 2020 when he gave the GOP nemesis the boot from the White House.
Some Republicans joked that Trump's running mate JD Vance was insurance for all practical purposes in the event that the party's presidential nominee was incapable of serving a full four-year term. Vance is only 39 years old with a birthday coming up in early August. A first-term U.S. Senate member from Ohio, Vance has minimal experience in government as someone who's young enough to be Trump's grandson.
But Harris and the Democrats could counter with a VP contender who's still middle-aged and more versed in the arts of politics and governing than Vance. The vice-presidential candidate for the GOP is a unique mix of Ivy League and Appalachian as a Yale law school graduate whose memoirs were converted into the television series Hillbilly Elegy.
Armed with Biden's immediate endorsement, Harris could narrow a VP search to a pair of Pennsylvanians in Governor Josh Sharpiro and U.S. Senator John Fetterman. Shapiro and Fetterman are 51 and 54 respectively. Both have had significant support across the aisle in a state that Democrats would have to carry to have any chance to prevail this fall.
California Governor Gavin Newsom apparently would be ineligible in light of a constitutional ban on presidential and VP nominees from the same state. Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer could give the Democrats a ticket with another historic twist with two women - one Black, the other white. Shapiro and Fetterman both are white.
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear, who's just 46, could be a possibility as a Democratic vice-president pick while Governors Phil Murphy of New Jersey and Roy Cooper of North Carolina could be in the mix of consideration on a running mate for the current VP. Cooper is 67 while Murphy is 66.
As a bald and beared leader who stands 6-8, Fetterman could give the Democrats a ticket member who would tower over Trump, be impossible to intimidate and potentially cut into the former president's support among white males.
But Beshear could be the leading VP contender in the infant stages of the Harris regime - and that could make him a major new cause for Republican consternation as someone from the same generation as Vance with a resume that includes a stint as the state attorney general before his elevation to governor in 2018. Beshear won two statewide races for governor and one for AG in a state where Trump scored more than 62 percent of the vote in 2020.
Biden said he made the decision to step away during the weekend after fiercely resisting calls to do so for weeks after a terrible showing at a debate with Trump in June. Harris has two weeks to prepare for her coronation at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago next month.
But Biden's timing seemed ideal just days after the Republican National Convention adjourned in Milwaukee as an event that revolved in large part on attacks aimed as much at Biden's age as his policies. Trump's speech at the RNC gave the Democrats a wealth of advertising material they can use to spotlight the dangers of having an elderly person as the president.
more to come ...
