Politics

Trump, 79, Hides Out for Three Days Amid Fears of Unraveling

OUT OF SIGHT...

The president is being heard from—but he has not been photographed for 72 hours.

President Donald Trump speaks about research into mental health treatments in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C., April 18, 2026.
Nathan Howard/Reuters

President Donald Trump, 79, is set to emerge in public for the first time in three days amid concerns that he’s unraveling behind closed doors.

The last time the president was seen in public was Saturday morning, April 18, at the White House, where he signed an executive order directing regulators to speed up the review of psychedelic treatments.

Later that day, he visited his golf club in Virginia, but the typically camera-seeking president stayed entirely behind closed doors for the rest of the weekend and on Monday.

Instead he peppered reporters with phone calls and posted or reposted repeatedly, more than 50 times since Saturday morning, on his Truth Social platform.

It comes as critics have raised the alarms about Trump’s increasingly erratic behavior, from his threatening posts to apparent confusion over Iran talks.

President Donald Trump has not appeared publicly in three days after speaking in the Oval Office after signing an Executive Order on Saturday, April 18, 2026.
President Donald Trump has not appeared publicly in three days after speaking in the Oval Office after signing an Executive Order on Saturday, April 18, 2026. Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images

The president is set to make his first public appearance in more than three days on Tuesday afternoon at the White House, where he’ll deliver remarks to the NCAA collegiate national champions.

Since the president’s last appearance on Saturday morning, he’s fired off a series of angry social media posts taking aim at Iran, Democrats, NATO allies, Apple, promoting election conspiracy theories, and more.

At the same time, he exhibited signs of confusion in a series of phone interviews on Sunday and Monday.

First, the president told ABC News that Vice President JD Vance would not participate in the next round of talks in Islamabad. His White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt almost immediately corrected him, stating that Vance was traveling for the talks.

On Monday, the confusion continued when Trump claimed Vance was in the air, only for the vice president to show up at the White House.

The president has also made a series of bizarre claims on Tuesday when he called into CNBC, where he argued he would have won the Vietnam War “very quickly” if he were president, despite dodging the draft. He also lied about inflation and rambled at length on a series of other subjects.

President Donald Trump and Special Envoy Steve Witkoff were spotted from afar departing the White House on Saturday, April 18, 2026.
President Donald Trump and Special Envoy Steve Witkoff were spotted from afar departing the White House on Saturday, April 18, 2026. Allison Robbert/For The Washington Post via Getty Images

It comes after a series of former Trump supporters turned critics have called for the 25th Amendment to be invoked to remove Trump from office after he threatened to wipe out Iranian civilization and target civilian infrastructure with profanity-filled posts as he struggled to get a peace deal.

On Saturday, the Wall Street Journal reported that Trump was purposefully kept from the room recently as the U.S. military worked to rescue downed airmen from Iran after he screamed at aides for hours.