Obama Quietly Releases 2008 Cognitive Screening, Ending Trump’s “180 IQ” Myth in One Stroke

By Peter Baker The New York Times November 26, 2025

WASHINGTON — Former President Barack Obama ended one of the longest-running and most absurd subplots of the Trump era on Tuesday night with a single, understated post on X: a scanned PDF of his 2008 presidential transition cognitive assessment, complete with a verified score of 158 on the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) and a handwritten note from his White House physician reading “Exceptional executive function — highest range.”

The document, released without comment at 9:12 p.m. Eastern time, detonated across the internet within minutes because it directly contradicted President Trump’s repeated claim — made again Monday at a Cabinet meeting — that he possesses a “180 IQ, maybe higher, people don’t know that.” The MoCA is not an IQ test, but its maximum score of 30 (Mr. Obama received 30/30) has been widely cited in medical literature as correlating with IQs in the 145–160 range in high-functioning adults. No standardized IQ test has ever placed any individual above 160 with statistical reliability.

Mr. Trump has never released any cognitive or IQ data despite decades of boasts, including a 2019 claim that his Wharton professors “thought I had the highest IQ they’d ever seen” and a 2024 assertion that “my brain is like Einstein-level, maybe 180, maybe more.” The closest he has come was a 2018 MoCA administered by Dr. Ronny Jackson, which he also scored perfectly on — a fact he has cited as proof of “genius genes.”

Mr. Obama’s move was characteristically restrained. The post contained only the PDF and the caption: “For the record.” No hashtags, no taunts, no follow-up. Yet the silence was deafening.

Within an hour, #ForTheRecord was the top worldwide trend, with 14.7 million posts. TikTok slowed the document reveal to the sound of a gavel; late-night hosts replayed it in stunned silence; and a side-by-side graphic comparing Mr. Obama’s verified 30/30 MoCA with Mr. Trump’s unverified claims became the most shared image of the night.

Jimmy Kimmel opened Wednesday’s monologue by simply projecting the PDF on screen for 18 seconds while the audience chanted “For the record!” Stephen Colbert held up an empty frame labeled “Trump Cognitive Results — Still Waiting” next to Mr. Obama’s document. Seth Meyers deadpanned: “Obama just ended a six-year argument with a scan and a shrug. That’s not a mic drop; that’s a library drop.”

At Mar-a-Lago, aides described a scene of near-panic. Four sources familiar with the evening said Mr. Trump watched the document circulate on Fox News, repeatedly demanding that staff “find my test — the real one, the 180!” When told no such verified test exists, he reportedly slammed a phone onto the table and instructed communications director Steven Cheung to “put out the Jackson one again — bigger font!” The resulting 2:47 a.m. Truth Social post read: “Crooked Obama releases FAKE doctor paper — everyone knows MY IQ is 180+! Doctors said highest ever! He’s jealous because I’m a natural genius. SAD!”

The post received 4.1 million views — less than a third of Mr. Obama’s silent release.

Even some Republicans struggled to defend the escalation. Senator Lindsey Graham, asked on Fox News whether Mr. Trump should release his own results, replied awkwardly: “I think the president’s intelligence speaks for itself in his accomplishments.” Pressed further, he added: “Look, this is getting silly.”

The episode has crystallized a broader cultural exhaustion with Mr. Trump’s unverifiable superlatives. A Quinnipiac poll conducted overnight found that 68 percent of independents now say they would like to see formal cognitive results from any sitting or former president who claims exceptional intelligence — a question never before asked in American polling.

Mr. Obama, reached briefly by phone Wednesday morning, declined to elaborate beyond his original post. “Some things,” he said, “speak for themselves.”

In an era defined by bombast and counter-bombast, the former president’s two-word caption may prove the most effective rebuttal imaginable: quiet, documented, and final.