US President Donald Trump and his wife Melania have contracted Covid-19. According to a White House official, as the President has been tested Covid-19 positive he will be working from the White House residence. Trump had on Thursday (local time) tweeted about him having tested positive for coronavirus.
Trump, 74, was diagnosed hours after it became publicly known that Hope Hicks, a top Trump aide who travelled with him on Air Force One and Marine One this week, tested positive on Thursday morning.
“Tonight, @FLOTUS and I tested positive for Covid-19,” the President tweeted just before 1 am. “We will begin our quarantine and recovery process immediately. We will get through this together!” Although stricken by Covid-19, Trump was showing only mild symptoms and was back on the job on Friday morning, his Chief of Staff Mark Meadows said.
“The American people can rest assured that we have a President that is not only on the job, will remain on the job and I’m optimistic that he’ll have a very quick and speedy recovery,” Meadows told reporters. “I got the five or six things that he had tasked me to do like I do every single morning. He is certainly wanting to make sure we stay engaged,” he said.
The development has hit Trump’s campaigning, with the presidential elections 32 days away on 3 November. The campaign events for Friday and the next few days have been cancelled, Trump Campaign Senior Adviser Corey Lewandowski told CBS News.
Trump has a debate with his Democratic Party challenger Joe Biden scheduled for 15 October. Vice President Mike Pence may have to pick up some campaign assignments but questions arise if the format of the campaign will change from what Trump has been following because the Covid-19 pandemic struck close to home.
He held tightly packed rallies with some supporters like him not wearing masks. Pence, who is next in line to take over from Trump if the need arises, has tested negative, his spokesperson Devin O’Malley tweeted. Biden, who was in a socially distanced debate on Tuesday with Trump, tested negative for the coronavirus, his personal doctor said.
The infection is a personal and political blow to Trump who had shown disdain for many of the precautions prescribed by health authorities to fight the pandemic. It could shake the confidence of his hardcore supporters who had followed his example in not wearing masks and questioning the health codes.
Meadows said that Trump’s first question to him Friday morning was “how is the economy doing how are the stimulus talks” with Congress. Trump and his wife Melania “remain in good spirits” and “the President does have mild symptoms and as we look to try to make sure that no only his health and safety and welfare is good, we continue to look at that for all of the American people,” Meadows said.
With agency inputs