The White House has offered a wild explanation for why Donald Trump was once again seen appearing to doze off in the Oval Office on Monday: He was actually blinking.
Trump, 79, was hosting an event on maternal health when he seemed to nod off behind his desk while surrounded by Cabinet members, Alabama Sen. Katie Britt, and Dr. Mehmet Oz, head of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
Videos and pictures of the president gained traction on social media, and before long, the White House’s rapid response team had seen enough.
“He was blinking, you absolute moron,” the X account wrote in response to a Reuters photograph of the president with his eyes shut.
The White House rapid response X account claimed Trump was just
When that particular photograph was taken, it is of course possible that Trump was mid-blink.
However, when reached for comment earlier about a video of the president appearing to nod off during the Oval Office event, the White House referred the Daily Beast to the same blinking excuse.
Democratic Representative Ted Lieu jumped on the Rapid Response post, sharing a video of Trump closing his eyes, writing: “Dear @RapidResponse47: That is a verrrrrrrrryyyyy long blink.”
The Democratic congressman called out Trump’s ‘verrrrrrrrryyyyy long blink.’ / X/TedLieu
The video showed the president’s eyes closed for 17 continuous seconds.
The White House did not immediately comment on the videos that appeared to show the president dozing off when approached by the Daily Beast again. White House Communications Director Steven Cheung did, however, respond sharply to Lieu: “Ted Lewd is a loser of the highest order and he needs to get serious professional help for his debilitating case of Trump Derangement Syndrome.”
Trump’s apparent nod-off fits a pattern. It occurred just a week after he seemed to have a bout with fatigue during an Oval Office event about the resumption of the Presidential Fitness Test in public schools. Similar occurrences happened in April, March—on multiple occasions—February, and January.
Trump shuts his eyes during Monday’s Oval Office event. / Evelyn Hockstein / REUTERS
That month, Trump, who regularly criticized his predecessor as “Sleepy Joe,” denied having fallen asleep in public. Instead, he told The Wall Street Journal that he shuts his eyes occasionally.
“It’s very relaxing to me,” he said. “Sometimes they’ll take a picture of me blinking, blinking, and they’ll catch me with the blink.”
Trump, of course, doesn’t get the recommended hours of sleep. In fact, a Daily Beast analysis found that in April, Trump’s late-night and early morning social media posting habits prevented him from getting a full night’s sleep on all but five nights.
Trump is about to travel to and from China, but won’t be catching up on sleep, if past trips are any guide.
CNN’s Kaitlan Collins previously revealed that the president has very little shut-eye then.
“He doesn’t sleep on these trips,” Collins told podcaster Jason Tartick last October. “And like, you’re going to Asia or something, and that’s kind of the only time you’re going to sleep, before you go on this trip, but Trump is just always up and talking, and he’ll like, have them go and wake staff up if they’re asleep because he wants to talk to them.”
She added: “I was just talking to someone about this because we wrote this story on what traveling with him is like in… I had this source who said, ‘You never wanna be on Air Force One on a trip’.”
