 "Republican presidential nominee and former US President Donald Trump speaks as he participates in an interview with billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk on the social media platform X, at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida. Image Courtesy: Margo Martin/Reuters")
It was expected to be a blockbuster interview and it didn’t disappoint. Tech billionaire Elon Musk and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump sat down on Monday night for a one-on-one on X, discussing topics as far-ranging as immigration, foreign relations and that unfortunate assassination attempt in Pennsylvania’s Buttler rally.
The chat , which lasted for about two hours, initially faced technical difficulties , delaying it by 40 minutes, with X owner Musk saying that the platform was suffering from “a massive DDOS attack”. For those who don’t know, DDOS stands for distributed denial of service and occurs when a site is flooded with traffic in an effort to make it inaccessible.
The two personalities — Trump and Musk — traded compliments while chatting with one another, with the US presidential candidate thanking Musk for his endorsement, saying: “Well, I appreciate that. That endorsement meant a lot to me. Not all endorsements mean that much. To be honest, your endorsement meant a lot.”
While the one-on-one will no doubt be the biggest news of the day, there’s another aspect of it that is making the news: Trump’s voice, especially a lisp, prompting many to raise questions about the 78-year-old Republican’s health.
Here’s what we know about it so far.
Trump’s lisp steals the show
While political pundits were making notes about the many claims that Donald Trump was making during his chat with Musk, there were many others who pointed out that the 78-year-old US presidential candidate seemed to speak with a lisp.
A number of people listening commented that Trump appeared to be speaking with a “lisp” throughout the highly anticipated live-streamed conversation with the billionaire. “Why does [Donald Trump] have a terrible ‘lisp’ in the [Elon Musk] X interview?” wrote one user. “Someone needs to adjust that microphone ASAP.”
Impact Shorts
More ShortsAnother wrote, “Is it just me… What is wrong with Trump’s voice?” “Sound like he has a lisp?”
“Trump got hit by the CIA lisp gun” posted a third.
Some even speculated that Trump’s lisp was a result of the 78-year-old removing his dentures, with one user writing on X: “That lisp. It’s familiar. That particular lisp is from someone without their dentures in. Does Donald Trump have dentures?”
Another added: “I’m am receiving lots of texts and messages about Donald Trump having severely slurred speech and a lisp.”
At one point during the Trump-Musk chat, the BBC reported that the words slurring, with over 20,000 mentions and dentures — with over 15,000 posts — became trending topics on X.
The lisp also led some to believe that it wasn’t Trump at all who was being interviewed, with one user writing: “I don’t care who you are. That isn’t Donald Trump speaking. Trump doesn’t have a lisp. And I recall at one of the rallies he called for the audio tech to be fired because of the bad microphone and audio. Eyes and ears wide open.”
Claims such as this one led to Conservative accounts circulating images, showing the Republican sitting down for the chat.
When asked about the so-called lisp and Trump’s voice, the Trump campaign told a Huffington Post reporter, “Must be your sh***y hearing. Get your ears checked.”
Trump’s health concerns
Trump’s apparent lisp that emerged during the chat with Musk once again raises the issue of the 78-year-old’s health. After Joe Biden exited the race for the White House, many have questioned if Trump is fit to run for office — after all, he’s only a few years younger than Biden.
A recent survey of American voters found that 58 per cent of them said that they found Trump to be too old to run for office. According to the Morning Consult survey, 51 per cent of the respondents said Trump is too old, up from 44 per cent. On the other hand, the percentage of people thinking the Republican leader is mentally fit has come down from 53 per cent to 48 per cent.
Trump, on the other hand, has boasted about his “vitality”, saying he aced two cognitive tests in the presidential debate against Biden. The public, however, knows very little about his health.
In November 2023, Trump’s personal physician issued a summary on his cognitive and physical condition. In it, the doctor wrote that Trump’s cognitive exams were “exceptional”. Moreover, his physical results were also within the normal range. However, the report did not include any details about Trump’s medications, blood pressure, or cholesterol levels.
Even after the assassination attempt on him in Pennsylvania, Trump has offered no updates on the extent of his injuries or his physical well-being. Trump’s campaign has refused to discuss his condition, release a medical report or records, or make the doctors who treated him available.
This doesn’t bode too well for Trump now, who is up against Vice President Kamala Harris from the Democratic Party. Harris, who is 59 years old, has erased the Democratic Party’s age problem, shifting it to Trump.
With inputs from agencies