Could Biden’s age be his biggest barrier to a second term?

Can the 80-year-old president avoid making any big mistakes between now and election day, asks Mary Dejevsky

It is a long time until 5 November 2024 (AP)

At four score years and five months, Joe Biden has announced that he will run for a second term – or, as we British-English speakers would say, “stand”, which might be more appropriate here. Were he to win, this would make him 82 on inauguration day and 86 by the time he left office, in the event that he served out his full term.

Now, I know a few people of similar vintage to whom I would happily entrust the power that resides in the Oval Office and the nuclear suitcase that comes with it, though I doubt they would relish the task. But anyone who argues that age will not be an issue in voters’ minds as the 2024 US presidential campaign gathers pace over the next 18 months is not living in the real world.

Of course it will be an issue. The question is what sort of an issue, and how hard it might be to surmount. It is probably fair to say that Ronald Reagan’s famous quip, when faced with the age question during his 1984 debate with Walter Mondale, has had its day. “I am not going to exploit, for political purposes, my opponent’s youth and inexperience” was an ingenious pre-emptive strike then but will not work to similar effect again.