On May 6, 2026, at a White House event honoring military mothers ahead of Mother's Day, photos showed Trump's hands covered in two different shades of concealer, neither matching his skin tone, and, according to the Daily Beast, looking swollen. A close-up shared by journalist Aaron Rupar drew 1.3 million views that evening, Newsweek reported. The Daily Beast noted that Trump has had a bruise on his right hand for at least a year and had more recently been covering his left hand as well, including the week before when he welcomed King Charles and Queen Camilla.
Asked for comment, White House spokesperson Davis Ingle said, “The president is a man of the people and he meets more Americans and shakes their hands on a daily basis than any other president in history.” The White House has previously attributed the bruising to frequent handshaking and Trump's aspirin regimen. In 2025, after Trump had mild swelling in his legs and bruising on one hand, tests found chronic venous insufficiency, a common condition in older adults in which blood pools in the veins, The National News Desk reported. Days after the event, the White House said Trump would have another checkup at Walter Reed on May 26, ahead of his 80th birthday on June 14.
The day before, at an Oval Office proclamation signing to restore the Presidential Fitness Test, Trump appeared to struggle to stay awake while Cabinet members spoke, his eyes opening and closing repeatedly, the Daily Beast reported. On May 7 at about 7 a.m., he posted on Truth Social an AI-generated image of Joe Biden asleep in the Oval Office with Barack Obama holding an “autopen” and Hillary Clinton looking on, while Hunter Biden appeared to snort cocaine off the Resolute Desk. Trump's caption: “A highly accurate depiction of the Sleepy Joe Biden Administration. Tremendous damage done but, WE'RE BACK!!!” The post revived his unsubstantiated claim that aides used an autopen to sign Biden's end-of-term pardons. The Daily Beast pointed to the irony of Trump, who “frequently nods off in public and at White House events,” attacking Biden for sleeping.
Correction (October 2, 2026): An earlier version said Trump “fell asleep” at the Resolute Desk, that he derailed a May 4 small-business summit with a 10-minute monologue on cognitive tests, that no White House physician had commented, that public-health observers linked his swollen hands to heart and circulatory conditions, that the image showed Clinton and Obama signing documents, and that polls found 59% questioned his mental acuity and 55% his physical fitness, and it counted “four documented incidents in four days.” The sources report only that he appeared to struggle to stay awake in the Oval Office; none of the entry's sources supports the summit, physician, health-observer or polling claims, which were removed along with the incident count; and the image shows Obama holding an autopen. The title was changed to match. The entry now adds the White House's own disclosure of a chronic venous insufficiency diagnosis in 2025.