President Donald Trump was spotted with a large, mysterious bruise on his hand in recent days.
In press photos from his Feb. 24 meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron, Trump was seen with a dark bruise covering a large section of the back of his right hand. It appears that makeup was used to try and cover the bruise for the photos.
When asked about the bruise, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said, “President Trump has bruises on his hand because he’s constantly working and shaking hands all day every day.”
“President Trump is a man of the people,” she added. “His commitment is unwavering, and he proves that every single day.”
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When Trump was sworn into office for his second presidential term on Jan. 20, he became the oldest president inaugurated, at 78 years and 7 months. His predecessor, Joe Biden, was the oldest president to serve, leaving office at 82 years and 61 days old.
According to Mayo Clinic, bruising is more common in older people, as the skin thins over time. Aging can also cause a decrease in the body’s fatty protective layer, leaving small blood vessels, known as capillaries, more vulnerable to breaking. When they do, blood leaks out of the vessels and becomes visible under the skin as a bruise.
Another possible cause of a large bruise is a blown vein. This happens when a blood vessel is damaged due to a needle insertion. Cleveland Clinic notes that this can occur when blood is drawn or an IV is inserted to give a patient medications or fluids.
In the fall of 2020, Trump was photographed with bandages on the back of his right hand, leading to some speculation about the possibility that he was receiving intravenous fluids. The photos came shortly after the then-president and his wife, Melania Trump, had been diagnosed with COVID-19.
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The bruise is one of many recent moments that have put Trump at the center of social media conversation.
Over the past several days, the president has announced major changes to the White House press pool that was blasted as an attempt to weaken the free press, declared himself “the king” with a fake Time magazine cover, suggested that he would turn the Gaza Strip into a Trump-branded beachfront property, and seized control of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts to have direct control over its programming.
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After firing 18 Democratic appointees from the Kennedy Center’s board and ordering new appointees to elect him chair, Trump declared the decision “something a lot of people wanted.”
“It got very wokey and some people were not happy with it, and some people refused to go,” he said in leaked audio of a phone call to the board, obtained by CNN’s Jake Tapper. “And we’re not going to have that.”
“I think we’re going to make it hot,” he added of the Kennedy Center, which became the first federally financed structure dedicated to the performing arts when it opened in 1971. “And we made the presidency hot, so this should be easy.”
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