ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA – MAY 25: U.S. President Donald Trump delivers remarks during a Memorial Day ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery on May 25, 2026 in Arlington, Virginia. Memorial Day honors those who died while serving in the U.S. armed forces. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
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A CNN medical analyst said Tuesday that the White House has questions to answer about the health of President Trump–who turns 80 next month–including an explanation for why “the president appears to struggle to stay awake during the day.”
Dr. Jonathan Reiner told CNN’s Kate Bolduan on News Central that there have been a series of “visible health concerns” in recent months that suggest the possibility of underlying health problems that have not been revealed by Trump or his administration. “He falls asleep very often,” Reiner said. “He’s fallen asleep in the Oval Office on multiple occasions with people talking to him in the cabinet room, and there was concern yesterday that he might have fallen asleep at Arlington National Cemetery during Memorial Day observances.”
WASHINGTON, DC – APRIL 23: Director of the Center for Medicare Chris Klomp (C) speaks alongside U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President and Chief Scientific Officer of Regeneron Pharmaceuticals George Yancopoulos and U.S. President Donald Trump during an event on advancing health care affordability in the Oval Office of the White House on April 23, 2026 in Washington, DC. President Trump, promoting his administration’s efforts to lower health care costs and address rising premiums, announced a deal with Regeneron Pharmaceuticals to lower certain drug prices sold on TrumpRx.gov in exchange for tariff relief. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)
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‘Urgent meeting with the back of his eyelids’
The president’s health–and in particular, his apparent drowsiness in public–has become an increasing subject of debate on cable news, with MS NOW’s Nicolle Wallace recently describing Trump as having an “urgent meeting with the back of his eyelids” during an event on healthcare affordability in the Oval Office. Wallace noted that the president’s penchant for extended late-night bursts of social media posts might mean Trump is not sleeping well.
“Between the hours of midnight and 2:45 a.m., Donald Trump posted on social media 18 times by our account, picking up again just after 7:30 a.m.,” Wallace told viewers.
‘It’s a real problem’ as Trump heads to physical exam
Trump, famously more comfortable talking than listening, has in recent Oval Office press availabilities closed his eyes for extended periods while others were speaking, with the White House forcefully denying the president had been asleep.
On CNN, Dr. Reiner noted that combined with the apparent difficulty the president has had staying alert, there have been unsatisfactory explanations for the bruising on Trump’s hands and swelling of his ankles, both captured extensively in photographs, and explained away by the White House as the result of shaking hands and “venous insufficiency” in the case of the swelling.
“I’ll be interested to see what testing they do today, because if they repeat some of the scans that have been done in the last year or so, that tells u they are surveilling something and that’s never been disclosed to us,” Reiner said.
WASHINGTON, DC – OCTOBER 10: U.S. President Donald Trump returns to the White House following a visit to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on October 10, 2025 in Washington, DC. President Trump traveled to Walter Reed to visit with troops and receive a medical check up. (Photo by Anna Rose Layden/Getty Images)
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Of the sleepiness, Reiner described it as “severe daytime somnolence,” also called hypersomnia, which is an uncontrollable urge to nod off during hours when a person would otherwise be expected to be refreshed and alert–like during work hours.
“I feel the same as I felt 50 years ago,” Trump said earlier this month at a White House event. “I’m not a senior. I’m far younger than a senior.” His presidential physician, Dr. Sean Barbabella, has described the president has being in “excellent overall health.”
Underlying health concerns–and few explanations
“It’s a real problem,” Reiner said. “And I’d like to hear what the White House has done to evaluate why the president has this increased daytime somnolence and what they’re doing to improve that.”
Trump was scheduled for a physical at Walter Reed National Military Center Tuesday, which NPR noted was his third exam in just over a year, raising concerns about his health. The White House described Tuesday’s exam as a “routine dental and medical assessment,” though less routine examinations–like a CT scan revealed in December–have not been fully explained.
As The New York Times has reported, “for more than a decade, Mr. Trump, his doctors and his aides have frequently issued terse, vague or rosy statements about the president’s fitness and health conditions.”
‘Threats to his life serve as reminders’
A separate CNN report Tuesday by Kevin Liptak said that Trump’s “advanced age,” combined with recent attempts on his life, “serve as reminders of his mortality,” a claim quickly dismissed by the White House.
“You’re an idiot, @kevinliptakcnn,” said the White House Rapid Response account in a post on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. “The ‘threats to his life serve as reminders’ that Radical Left lunatics–incited by outlets like gutter trash CNN–keep trying to murder him. And @POTUS works harder in one day than you have in your entire life.”
In his piece, Liptak noted that Trump’s aides have been working to describe the president as active and vital. “His aides are quick to point out when he is working late,” Liptak said, “as they did this weekend, when a communications aide announced the president was in the Oval Office at 9:30 p.m.”