MS NOW anchor Katy Tur has spent over a decade watching Donald Trump—and what she sees now troubles her deeply.
On Monday, March 30, 2026, the 42-year-old host of “Katy Tur Reports” devoted a segment to a question once considered taboo for mainstream broadcasters: “Is Donald Trump well? Is his head in the presidency? Does he have the mental acuity to lead this country?”
Tur cited two recent polls to support her concerns. A Washington Post/ABC/Ipsos survey found that 56% of respondents believe the president “lacks the mental sharpness to serve effectively.” A separate Reuters/Ipsos poll showed six in 10 Americans now say President Trump is becoming more erratic as he ages—with doubts extending beyond Democrats to Republicans and independents.
The segment built on observations Tur first shared during a November 2025 appearance on The Daily Beast Podcast, where she spoke candidly about the changes she has witnessed in Trump since first covering him in 2015. “He is different than he was,” she said. “He doesn’t have the same amount of energy. He’s not as coherent as he used to be.”
Tur’s perspective carries weight. She was the first network news reporter assigned to the Trump campaign full-time, beginning in June 2015 when she attended her very first Trump rally in New Hampshire. Over more than 500 days on the trail, she made more than 3,800 live television reports and visited 40 states. Trump frequently singled her out from the podium, calling her “Little Katy” and a “third-rate reporter.” Her 2017 book “Unbelievable” chronicled her experiences covering his first successful run for the White House.
At 79, Trump is the oldest person in American history to assume the presidency upon a second inauguration. He turns 80 in June. The New York Times published a November 25, 2025 story headlined “Shorter Days, Signs of Fatigue: Trump Faces Realities of Aging in Office,” reporting that Trump “has fewer public events on his schedule” than during his first term. The paper also noted an Oval Office appearance where “his eyelids drooped until his eyes were almost closed, and he appeared to doze on and off for several seconds.”
Trump responded to the Times report with fury, calling the writer “ugly, both inside and out” and insisting on Truth Social: “There will be a day when I run low on Energy, it happens to everyone, but with a PERFECT PHYSICAL EXAM AND A COMPREHENSIVE COGNITIVE TEST (‘That was aced’) JUST RECENTLY TAKEN, it certainly is not now!”
The White House has pushed back forcefully against scrutiny of the president’s condition. White House Assistant Press Secretary Liz Huston told The Daily Beast that “President Trump is the most accessible, energetic, and transparent president in modern American history,” adding that “Katy Tur has long suffered from a severe case of Trump Derangement Syndrome.”
But Tur has also been careful to note context. In her November podcast appearance, she observed that Trump remains far more active than President Joe Biden was in his final months in office. “He’s doing overseas travel, he’s coming back,” she said. “He is very much still engaged.”
Still, the anchor argued that reporters have an obligation to ask hard questions about presidential fitness. Trump underwent an MRI at his latest checkup, though neither he nor his press team has provided a clear explanation for why doctors requested the scan. He has been diagnosed with chronic venous insufficiency, and photos have captured bruising on his hands and a neck rash that his physician attributed to a medicated cream used as a “preventative” treatment.
Presidential fitness has become an especially charged topic in American politics since Biden’s disastrous June 2024 debate performance, which led to his withdrawal from the race. White House reporters now face pressure to apply the same scrutiny to Trump’s aging that they did to his predecessor.
“We have a job to acknowledge the reality in front of us,” Tur said. For a journalist who has covered Trump longer than almost anyone in television news, that reality has clearly changed.
“Katy Tur Reports” airs weekdays from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. ET on MS NOW.
