Meadows Claims in New Book That Trump Tested Positive for COVID Days Before 2020 Debate With Biden
14:22 GMT 01.12.2021 (Updated: 14:49 GMT 01.12.2021)
© AP Photo / Evan Vucci
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On 2 October 2020, then-president Donald Trump announced on Twitter that he and his wife, Melania, had both tested positive for COVID-19. He was moved to Walter Reed military hospital in Bethseda, Maryland where he received an infusion of medicines, and returned to the White House after a three-night hospital stay.
Donald Trump tested positive for COVID-19 three days before his first debate against then-Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden but went ahead with it anyway, claims former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows.
The revelation, pounced upon by media outlets, is purportedly contained in Meadows’ upcoming book, The Chief’s Chief, an early copy of which is cited by The Guardian.
The positive test on 26 September was registered using an old model kit and Trump was shortly tested again using “the Binax system" before receiving a negative result. But Meadows offers a lurid description of the “shock” reverberating within the White House after that first verdict.
Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani listens as U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a news conference in the Briefing Room of the White House on September 27, 2020 in Washington, DC.
© AP Photo / JOSHUA ROBERTS
According to the cited volume, the WH doctor was called as Trump was scheduled to take off on Marine One for a rally in Pennsylvania shortly after attending the Supreme Court confirmation event for Amy Coney Barrett. That gathering was later determined to have been a coronavirus super-spreader event.
“Stop the president from leaving… He just tested positive for COVID,” Meadows claims to have been told by Sean Conley.
Judge Amy Coney Barrett, President Donald Trumps nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court, meets with Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Oct. 1, 2020
© AP Photo / Demetrius Freeman
While it was reportedly too late to stop Trump, when the ex-POTUS called from Air Force One, his chief of staff subsequently informed him of the “bad news.”
Trump’s reply was said to have “rhyme[d] with ‘Oh spit, you’ve gotta be trucking lidding me.’”
Meadows reportedly writes that he told Trump that the test would be repeated with “the Binax system, and that we were hoping the first test was a false positive."
After “a brief but tense wait” it was revealed that the then-president who ostensibly used “buckets of hand sanitiser” and chose to refrain from seeing anyone who “ha[d]n’t been rigorously tested,” was Covid-19 negative.
As Meadows called back with the news he could “almost hear the collective ‘Thank God’ that echoed through the cabin,” according to the cited book.
After the news, Trump is described as having taken it as “full permission to press on as if nothing had happened," despite looking “a little tired” and suspecting a “slight cold,” according to the news outlet.
The former chief of staff reportedly “instructed everyone in his immediate circle to treat him as if he was positive."
In his book, set to be published next week by All Seasons Press, a Meadows serves up a graphic description of Trump on the day of the debate, 29 September. According to the book account, Trump looked “slightly better."
President Trump and Joe Biden will meet tonight in Cleveland for the first presidential debate. The debate will be moderated by "Fox News Sunday" anchor Chris Wallace. Watch live on CBSN at 8:30 p.m. ET https://t.co/ZIkhTBmT4g pic.twitter.com/MI9wIuCQep
— CBS News (@CBSNews) September 29, 2020
“His face, for the most part at least, had regained its usual light bronze hue, and the gravel in his voice was gone. But the dark circles under his eyes had deepened… He walked like he was carrying a little extra weight on his back.”
Fox News’ Chris Wallace was cited as saying that Trump was not tested before the event as planned because he had arrived late at the site.
It was not until 2 October that Trump announced that he had tested positive for COVID-19, after news of a cluster of infections at the White House. The then-president was taken to Walter Reed that day after announcing his own and wife Melania’s diagnosis via Twitter.
President Donald Trump gives thumbs up on the Blue Room Balcony upon returning to the White House Monday, Oct. 5, 2020
© AP Photo / Alex Brandon
The revelations chewing on the supposedly unreported positive test contained in Meadows’ memoir feed into last year’s speculation about whether Trump had the coronavirus when he faced Biden, 77, in Cleveland.
