The positive Covid-19 test of a close collaborator, Hope Hicks, forced President Donald Trump to undergo it on Thursday 1er October. “I’ll have the results tonight or tomorrow morning, but you know I spend a lot of time with Hope, just like the first lady”, he said in an interview with Fox News. “Do we have to quarantine ourselves?” I do not know “, said Donald Trump. Moments later, he indicated on his Twitter account that he was effectively isolating himself, along with his wife, Melania, officially awaiting the results.
The president’s schedule for Friday, released Thursday night, mentioned a meeting with supporters at the Trump Hotel in Washington before a departure for Florida. Donald Trump was indeed to hold a political meeting in Sanford, near Orlando, before returning in the evening to the federal capital.
Returning to the White House in February after a detour by Fox News’ communications management, Hope Hicks is one of the few people outside of her family to have the president’s confidence. She was on Air Force One with Donald Trump when he traveled to Cleveland, Ohio on Tuesday to participate in the debate between him and Joe Biden. She also traveled with him the next day Wednesday when he moved to Minnesota for a campaign rally.
None wore a mask
It was during this trip that the young woman tested positive for the coronavirus and left the presidential procession. She had previously traveled not only with the president but also with his bodyguards, including his son-in-law Jared Kushner, one of his most influential advisers, and his director of digital communications, Dan Scavino, alongside Donald Trump for more than two decades. When the small group had left the West Wing on board Marine One, the presidential helicopter, on Wednesday, heading to Andrew’s military base, none wore a mask. These close advisers generally refrain from bringing them, while the president hardly ever wears one.
This is not the first time, however, that the virus has hit the White House. National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien tested positive in July, as did several Secret Service agents, responsible in the United States for the protection of personalities, some of whom were present at the meeting held in June in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Katie Miller, spokesperson for Vice President Mike Pence, had tested positive in May. None of these people, however, enjoys access to the president comparable to that of Hope Hicks, present at his side since he entered politics five years ago.
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