President Donald Trump’s skin has become so delicate in his old age that a high-five with his attorney general Pam Bondi left him with a bleeding hand, according to reports.
In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, the president admitted Bondi had broken his skin when she accidentally nicked him with her ring at the 2024 Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.
“The ring hit the back of my hand, and, yes, there was a slight little cut,” Trump said, adding that he uses makeup to conceal bruising when his hands get “whacked again by someone”.
“I have makeup that’s, you know, easy to put on, takes about 10 seconds,” he said.
Inside sources told the WSJ that the incident had alarmed some witnesses, and was only one of several occasions in which his hand has suffered wounds in recent years.
The admission came as part of a wide-ranging report on Trump’s health, in which the 79-year-old junk food aficionado dismissed concerns about his condition and insisted that he is in “perfect” shape.
The report also revealed that Trump has sometimes been wearing compression socks to treat leg swelling, is taking more aspirin than his doctors advise, and has asked his staff to slim down his meeting schedule.
But he denied having any hearing problems, and denied ever dozing off during public events at the White House — despite testimony to the contrary from people close to him.
“I’ll just close [my eyes]. It’s very relaxing to me,” he said. “Sometimes they’ll take a picture of me blinking, blinking, and they’ll catch me with the blink.”
Trump’s bruised hands — and the heavy makeup used to cover them — have become a regular topic of public speculation over the past year as they are often visible in photos and videos.
During a speech at the White House Congressional Ball in December, his hand was visibly smeared with makeup, and during a cabinet meeting there were two large Band-Aids on the back of his right hand.
In his interview, Trump insisted that this was the result of the large amount of aspirin he takes, which he said makes him susceptible to bruising.
That matches an explanation given by the White House last July, which blamed the problem on “minor soft tissue irritation from frequent handshaking and the use of aspirin.”
Officials have said that Trump has been diagnosed with chronic venous insufficiency, a common and non-life-threatening condition in which the valves which pump blood upwards through the legs begin to cause function, causing some blood to flow back down and pool in the lower legs.
