Turns out Donald Trump’s visit to Walter Reed was for a serious health issue – and Mike Pence nearly had to take over

One of the surest signs that an increasing number of people around Donald Trump aren’t expecting him to win, and don’t even necessarily want him to win: they’re leaking dirt about him like a sieve as election day approaches. The latest leak centers around Trump’s mysterious visit to Walter Reed Medical Center, which his handlers then tried to cover up with a series of lies.

No one ever believed that Trump suddenly decided to be rushed to the hospital just so he could complete a portion of his annual physical three months early because he was simply bored that day, as his handlers have long ludicrously claimed. The question was what really happened during that visit, and why his handlers were so desperate to cover it up. Now we’re getting some answers from the inside.

Someone in Donald Trump’s orbit has leaked to New York Times journalist Michael S. Schmidt that whatever was going on with Trump’s Walter Reed incident, Mike Pence was asked to be “on standby” to take over the presidency if Trump ended up having to undergo a “procedure” under anesthesia. This means that whatever health issue prompted Trump’s hospital run, it was dire enough that his medical handlers thought he might end up needing emergency surgery.

There are various of kinds of health emergencies that can require emergency surgery and anesthetization, and there’s probably no point in guessing what specific health emergency Donald Trump was having that night. But it’s definitely worth noting that in the nine months since Trump’s Walter Reed incident, his physical and cognitive health has been in visible and steady decline. Whatever went wrong with Trump’s health during that incident, he clearly never recovered from it – and it appears to be getting worse.