Haley: Vote for me, I’ve got all my marbles
Byron York
HALEY: VOTE FOR ME, I’VE GOT ALL MY MARBLES. Of all the candidates running for president at the moment, just one, former South Carolina Gov. and United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, has chosen to emphasize what is called the “generational” nature of the campaign. The short definition for “generational” is: Those other guys are too old to be president. It’s time for someone younger, like me.
“We’re ready to move past the stale ideas and faded names of the past, and we are more than ready for a new generation to lead us into the future,” Haley said in her February announcement speech in Charleston. “I come here today with a vision of that future.” To put some teeth in that vision, Haley called for “mandatory mental competency tests for politicians over 75 years old.”
Haley, who will be 53 years old when the next president’s term begins in 2025 — her birthday is Inauguration Day, Jan. 20 — had two targets clearly in mind. The first is the front-runner for the Republican nomination, former President Donald Trump, who will be 78 years old on Inauguration Day and, should he win the presidency again, would serve until age 82. The second is President Joe Biden, who will be 82 years old and, should he win reelection, would serve until age 86.
Trump and Biden are the two biggest names in politics. So, of course, Haley, seeking an advantage early in the race, is going after them. But the generational appeal is also a response to the strange gerontocracy that took hold in Washington in recent years and is only now, perhaps, loosening its grip. In Biden’s first years, there was a president nearing 80 and a speaker of the House, plus other top Democratic officials in the House, all over 80. On the Senate side, the Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, is 81, and the majority leader, Charles Schumer, is the youngster in the group at 72.
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So Haley clearly has something to discuss. And now, she has taken aim at another gerontocratic embarrassment, the continued service of Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA). The California Democrat is 89 years old and has been in clear cognitive decline. She is not running for reelection in 2024 — that would have been impossible — but the question is whether she should serve out her term, until January 2025.
Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) has called on Feinstein to step down now. “While she has had a lifetime of public service, it is obvious she can no longer fulfill her duties,” Khanna tweeted in mid-April. But former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who is 83 and still a member of the House, has criticized those calling on Feinstein to quit, suggesting there is sexism in their criticism.
Now Haley has jumped into the fray with an op-ed on Fox News headlined, “It’s time for a competency test for politicians.” She called Feinstein “a trailblazer who’s made an indelible mark in public service.” But Haley continued: “It’s been obvious for quite some time that she’s in significant mental and physical decline. … At 89 years old, she is a prime example of why we need mental competency tests for politicians.”
By bringing the age subject to the fore, Haley has made a real contribution to the presidential race. Everybody knows Biden is too old for another term — he’s too old for this one — but Democrats have fallen in line behind the president because they don’t see any credible alternative. That’s especially concerning given the prospect of Vice President Kamala Harris, whom no one wants to become president, as first in line behind the oldest chief executive in history.
Trump is far more vigorous than Biden, but he is still asking voters to put him in the White House until he is 82 years old. Isn’t that too much of a chance to take, especially given that people have watched Biden decline before their very eyes? The 2020 presidential vote was, in part, a bet that Biden could serve at such an advanced age. It hasn’t really worked out. Now, a 2024 vote for Trump would be the same sort of bet, risking the same result.
In the Senate, apart from the Feinstein situation, we’ve just seen at least one rational voice on the age matter. Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD), who is up for reelection in 2024 and would be 80 at the start of the next term and 86 at the end, recently announced he would not run again. Cardin summed it up with a simple, “It’s time.”
Other senators have not made the same choice. Last year, Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA) won election to an eighth term in the Senate that will take him until age 95. Despite Grassley’s vigor and impressive record, that’s too old for the job.
In her home state, Haley saw one of the worst examples of a politician who would not leave office. Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-SC), who surely had one of the strongest physical constitutions of anyone ever to serve, ran for reelection at age 94, won, and served until age 100. But the last term was a ghastly affair. Thurmond, in deep mental decline, just wasn’t there, and Senate colleagues knew they had to deal with a trusted aide to work for Thurmond’s vote. That should not happen in the nation’s highest offices.
It’s unlikely a President Haley would be able to impose “mandatory mental competency tests for politicians over 75 years old.” The Constitution sets the qualifications for federal office, and they are quite minimal. But Haley deserves credit for pushing hard on the generational issue. Could there be any matter more important than whether a president, elected in 2024, will be mentally and physically able to serve a four-year term? It’s the most basic question there is, and Haley is asking it.
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