EGN NEWS DESK
“Donald hates his birthdays,” Ivana Trump as soon as mentioned of her former husband.
He appeared to hate this one, on Friday, particularly. He seemed genuinely upset earlier this week when his supporters sang an early “Happy Birthday” to him at a rally in Las Vegas. “You know,” he informed them, “there’s a sure level at which you don’t wish to hear ‘Happy Birthday.’ You simply wish to faux the day doesn’t exist.”
No doubt. Now 78, he’s attempting to persuade the nation to present him one other 4 years in workplace, on the finish of which he can be the oldest president in American historical past — a mantle held by the present, 81-year-old occupant of the Oval Office.
On the marketing campaign path, each males attempt to downplay their age whereas making the opposite seem as creaky and cranky as doable.
The Trump staff spent the week blasting out selectively edited movies of Mr. Biden toddling round Europe, trying like Corrado Soprano misplaced in Newark. “We have a president who has no clue what the hell is occurring,” Mr. Trump mentioned at a birthday celebration with supporters in Palm Beach, Fla., on Friday night.
The Biden marketing campaign hit again with an e mail on Mr. Trump’s birthday, reminding voters that he had fallen asleep at his personal trial, a case that resulted in felony convictions. “He is unhinged, unable to focus and diminishing earlier than our very eyes,” James Singer, a Biden marketing campaign spokesman, mentioned of the previous president.
Mr. Trump used to have enjoyable on his birthdays. “Donald was the kid who would throw the cake on the birthday events,” his youthful brother Robert as soon as informed the journalist Marie Brenner. After he grew to become a mogul, Mr. Trump would throw swinging events at his casinos in Atlantic City, N.J., just like the one at Trump’s Castle in 1988, for his forty second birthday, when he performed movies of Liza Minnelli and Billy Crystal wishing him a cheerful birthday. (President Ronald Reagan despatched a telegram.)
Two years later, Mr. Trump’s birthday party was hosted by Robin Leach, from the TV present “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous.” Dolly Parton and Elton John despatched movies, Andrew Dice Clay carried out, and a George H.W. Bush imitator declared that Mr. Trump ought to someday be president. At Mr. Trump’s fiftieth birthday celebration, in Trump Tower in New York, Eartha Kitt sang to him, and there was an ice sculpture of Marla Maples, then his spouse, in mermaid kind.
There weren’t any mermaids or Catwomen at his 78th. It was held on the Palm Beach County Convention Center close to the airport by a bunch of supporters who name themselves Club 47 USA, a hopeful reference to Trump’s aspiration to turn out to be the forty seventh president. General admission price $25.
“There’s nowhere else I’d quite be,” Mr. Trump mentioned to tons of of his supporters who stuffed the conference heart, some pushing and cursing at each other to get a spot nearer the stage, the place a tiered cake sat. Images of Mr. Trump enjoying golf and sitting behind the resolute desk have been painted into the icing. (The cake additionally wore a pink MAGA hat.)
The final time he addressed this group, in October, he opened up concerning the day that he ordered a drone strike on Iran’s prime safety and intelligence commander, Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani.
“Nobody’s heard this story earlier than,” Mr. Trump informed them. “But I’d like to inform it to Club 47, since you’ve been so loyal.” He additionally talked at that occasion about his disappointment with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel — although it was solely 4 days after the Hamas-led Oct. 7 assault on the nation. “I’ll always remember that Bibi Netanyahu allow us to down,” Mr. Trump mentioned then.
His solely dwelling sibling, Elizabeth Trump, had turned up for the birthday occasion Friday. “Where’s Elizabeth?” he requested from the stage. “Right there. My lovely sister. She’s a fantastic sister. Great one.”
Also, there was Marco Rubio, a vice-presidential contender who had been taking a refined strategy to auditioning for the job. “I’m going to be trustworthy with you,” Mr. Rubio mentioned from the stage. “Sometimes, I believe, Why is that this man doing this? He had a fantastic life. He didn’t must be in politics. There’s just one purpose why somebody like him can be in politics, with all of those hassles, with all of these items he has to place up with. There’s just one purpose — as a result of he loves our nation and he needs to reserve it from those who wish to destroy it.”
Kellyanne Conway was there, too, in addition to a 101-year-old World War II veteran who, Mr. Trump declared, seemed “a hell of lots higher than Biden.”
A day earlier, Mr. Trump had been celebrated by a bunch that has not all the time been as loyal as Club 47: Republican lawmakers. At a gathering on Capitol Hill, House Republicans serenaded him, and G.O.P. senators introduced a vanilla-frosted cake with massive “45” and “47” candles caught into it.
But there’s something about turning 78 that makes a person ponder his mortality. At the rally in Las Vegas, Mr. Trump had, in a uncommon second of introspection, riffed about his previous age.
“My father lived a very long time, my mom lived a very long time, and so they have been comfortable, and so they have been nice,” he mentioned, sounding a bit muted. “So possibly we’re going to dwell a very long time. I hope so.”
