“Donald hates birthdays,” Ivana Trump once said about her ex-husband.
He seemed especially averse to the day on Friday. Earlier this week, he seemed genuinely upset when supporters sang him an early “Happy Birthday” at a rally in Las Vegas. “You know, there are certain moments when you just don’t want to hear ‘Happy Birthday,’ you just want to act like the day doesn’t exist,” he told supporters.
Make no mistake. At 78 years old, he’s trying to convince Americans to give him another four years in office, which would make him the oldest president in American history — a position currently held by an 81-year-old president sitting in the Oval Office.
During the campaign, both men downplayed their age and tried to make their opponents appear as old and grumpy as possible.
The Trump campaign has been playing carefully edited videos this week of Biden tottering around Europe like a corrado soprano lost in Newark. “We have a president who has no idea what the hell is going on,” Trump said Friday evening as he celebrated his birthday with supporters in Palm Beach, Florida.
The Biden campaign hit back with an email on Trump’s birthday, reminding voters that Trump had fallen asleep during his own trial, which led to a felony conviction. Biden campaign spokesman James Singer said of Trump, “He is losing his mind, he is unable to focus and he is deteriorating before our eyes.”
Trump enjoyed birthdays. “Donald was the kind of kid who would throw cakes at birthday parties,” his brother Robert once told journalist Marie Brenner. After he became a big shot, Trump threw swingers at casinos in Atlantic City, New Jersey. In 1988, when he threw his 42nd birthday party at Trump Castle, he played a video of Liza Minnelli and Billy Crystal celebrating his birthday. (President Ronald Reagan sent a telegram.)
Two years later, Trump’s birthday party was hosted by Robin Leach of the TV show Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous. It featured videos from Dolly Parton and Elton John, a performance from Andrew Dice Clay, and a George H. W. Bush impersonator who proclaimed that Trump should one day become president. Trump’s 50th birthday celebration at Trump Tower in New York featured songs from Eartha Kitt and an ice sculpture of his then-wife, Marla Maples, as a mermaid.
There were no mermaids or catwomen at Trump’s 78th birthday party. The party was held at the Palm Beach County Convention Center near the airport by a group of Trump supporters calling themselves “Club 47 USA,” in reference to Trump’s desire to become the 47th president of the United States. General admission was $25.
“There’s no place I’d rather be than right here,” Trump told hundreds of supporters who packed the convention center, some of whom jostled and shouted insults to get closer to the stage where a tiered cake was laid out in icing depicting Trump playing golf and sitting imperious behind a desk. (The cake also featured a red MAGA hat.)
Trump last addressed the group in October, when he spoke about the day he ordered a drone strike against Iran’s top security and intelligence commander, Maj. Gen. Qassim Soleimani.
“Nobody’s ever heard this story before,” Trump told them, “but I want to tell you, Club 47, you’ve been so loyal.” Trump also spoke about his disappointment in Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the event, just four days after the Hamas-led attack on Israel on October 7. “I’ll never forget how Bibi Netanyahu let us down,” Trump said at the time.
His only surviving sister, Elizabeth Trump, was at the birthday event on Friday. “Where’s Elizabeth?” he asked from the stage. “She’s over there. That’s my beautiful sister. She’s a great sister. A great sister.”
Also there was vice presidential candidate Marco Rubio, who took a subtle approach to his presidential audition: “Honestly, sometimes I wonder, why is this guy doing this? He’s had a great life. He didn’t need to get into politics. There’s only one reason why a guy like him would get into politics, with all the hassle and stuff he has to put up with, and there’s only one reason, and that’s because he loves this country and he wants to save this country from people who are trying to destroy it,” Rubio said from the stage.
Kellyanne Conway was also there, as was a 101-year-old World War II veteran who declared that Trump “looked a lot better than Biden.”
The day before, Trump had received congratulations from a group not necessarily as loyal as Club 47: Republican lawmakers. At a Capitol Hill meeting, House Republicans serenaded Trump, and GOP senators presented him with a vanilla frosted cake with giant candles reading “45” and “47.”
But at 78, people start thinking deeply about their own mortality, and in a rare moment of reflection at the Las Vegas rally, Trump spoke about his own old age.
“Both my mother and father lived long lives. They were happy, wonderful people,” he said, lowering his voice. “So maybe we’ll live long lives too. I hope so.”
