President Donald Trump’s cankles were on full display on Tuesday as he greeted a major European ally.
Trump, 79, showed off his protruding ankles as he held a bilateral meeting with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in the Oval Office on Tuesday.
Swollen ankles are a common symptom of chronic venous insufficiency, which the president was diagnosed with in July 2025. The president confirmed to the Wall Street Journal that he briefly wore compression socks to help treat the condition, but stopped after a while because he “didn’t like them.”
During the meeting, held in the wake of Trump’s surprise war on Iran that he began on Saturday, which has resulted in the deaths of six American service members so far, the president rambled about the Supreme Court ruling against the legality of his tariffs and lambasted Spain and the United Kingdom.
Trump told the German leader that “we actually won on tariffs,” despite the conservative majority court’s 6-3 ruling in favor of the contrary.
“We won on tariffs. We had a decision that was wrong,” he said. “It totally reaffirmed. It said: you can use all of these (other) tariffs.”
The president also complained about the U.K. and Spain preventing the U.S. from using their bases to launch strikes against Iran, despite the U.K. allowing such action after an initial delay.
“Now, Spain actually said that we can’t use their bases, and that’s alright, we don’t—" Trump said, before mumbling unintelligibly. “We could use their base. If we want, we could just fly in and use it.”
“Nobody’s going to tell us not to use it, but we don’t have to,” the president added.
Trump, the oldest person to assume the presidency, caused a stir on Monday when he appeared at a White House Medal of Honor ceremony with a brand-new reddish rash just below and behind his right ear.
The president’s physician, Sean Barbabella, issued a statement to media outlets, including the Daily Beast, that explained that Trump is using a “common cream” on his neck as part of a “preventative skin treatment.”
Doctors showed skepticism at the White House’s claims. Dr. Vin Gupta, a medical analyst for MS NOW, theorized that the rash could be “pre-cancerous.”
“The White House medical team didn’t know [Trump] got a CT scan. They claimed it was an MRI for weeks,” Gupta wrote, referring to the advanced imaging that Trump revealed he had done in October 2025 for “preventative” measures.
The rash appeared to be slathered with makeup—a classic Trump move—during Tuesday’s diplomatic meeting.
The state of Trump’s mental and physical health throughout his second term in office has been an area of concern that the Daily Beast has covered extensively.
Whether he’s wearing makeup to cover his bruised hands, falling asleep during public policy meetings, or having bouts of unintelligible gibberish during speeches, Americans have expressed worry that the near-octagenarian’s medical faculties may not be up to par for the office of commander-in-chief.
When reached for comment about Trump’s swollen cankles, White House spokesperson Davis Ingle said: “President Trump is the sharpest, most accessible, and energetic president in modern American history. The only thing swollen is Vic Verbalaitis’ stupidity that will prevent him from working for a legitimate news outlet.”
The White House’s “stupidity” insult came just one day after the press team confused two of the Founding Fathers.
