When I wrote,

How could a distinguished professor of biology, a leader of the HGP and advisor to the US President, get something so elementary wrong, when even a biology undergrad dropout like myself notices this seems wrong?

That sentence should be read with a 'but' at the beginning. I was saying that I couldn't believe he would make such a basic mistake. I thought I must be missing something. That's why I posted here instead of dismissing the whole thing as him being wrong.

I recognize I'm emotionally biased against deathism and thereby against people who appear to be pro-deathism. But I did make an effort to find out the actual truth.

Your second comment appears to be factually wrong:

There isn't a gene or behavior 'for' aging, and therefore there isn't an available mutation that doesn't age because it doesn't have that gene, and so evolution can't select it.

There are definitely are genes which affect aging, so there is something to select for.

You're right; there are definitely genes which affect aging and longevity and can be selected. And I expect that if they have no other effect, then the selection prefers those variants which confer longevity. It's only when they are tied to tradeoffs or other effects caused by the same genes, that the selected variant may not be the longest-lived.