Trump Resumes Campaign With Florida Demonstration 10 Days After COVID-19 Disclosure

Washington: President Donald Trump will attempt to put his fight with COVID-19 behind him when he returns to the election campaign on Monday, beginning a three-week sprint towards the November 3 US election with a rally in the battlefield Florida state. .

The event at an airport in Sanford, Florida, will be Trump’s first campaign rally since he revealed on Oct.2 that he tested positive for COVID-19. Trump, who spent three nights in the hospital for treatment, said Sunday that he had made a full recovery and was no longer infectious, but did not directly say whether he had tested negative for the coronavirus.

The 74-year-old Republican president seeks to change the dynamics of a career that national opinion polls and some state polls show he is losing to Democratic challenger Joe Biden, 77.

For months, Trump had worked furiously to divert public attention from the virus and his handling of the pandemic, which has infected nearly 7.7 million people in the United States, killed more than 214,000 and left millions out of work.

His own illness has put the spotlight directly on his response to the coronavirus during the final leg of the race.

In a sign of new optimism, Biden heads to Ohio on Monday, a state that Trump won by 8 percentage points in 2016 and almost certainly must continue to win. It’s Biden’s second campaign trip in as many weeks to Ohio, once thought out of reach, but where polls now show a tight race.

Trump’s rally in Florida, and planned rallies in Pennsylvania on Tuesday, Iowa on Wednesday and North Carolina on Thursday, will be watched closely to see if the president has reshaped his campaign approach since contracting the virus.

Critics blame him for failing to encourage supporters at campaign events, and even White House staff, to wear protective masks and abide by social distancing guidelines. At least 11 close Trump advisers have tested positive for the coronavirus.

Standing alone on a White House balcony on Saturday, an unmasked Trump urged hundreds of supporters, mostly black and Latino, to help win the vote. Most of the crowd wore masks but ignored social distancing guidelines.

Biden, who has said it is irresponsible for any candidate to hold events where attendees do not wear masks or engage in social distancing, lashed out at the president’s approach.

“President Trump comes to Sanford today bringing nothing but reckless behavior, divisive rhetoric and sowing fear,” Biden, the former Democratic vice president, said in a statement.

Trump told Fox News in an interview Sunday that he was feeling fine and pointed to his doctor’s memo from Saturday saying he had done a test showing he was no longer contagious.

“I passed the highest test, the highest standards and I am in great shape,” Trump told “Sunday Morning Futures.” Trump also said, without presenting evidence, that he was now immune, a claim that attracted a Twitter flag for violating the social media platform’s rules on misleading information related to COVID-19.

Scientific research has not been conclusive on how long people who have recovered from COVID-19 have antibodies and are protected from a second infection.

The most recent polls in Florida, where a defeat of Trump would drastically reduce his path to re-election, show Biden with a slight lead. Trump won Florida over Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in 2016 by just 1.2 percentage points, helping him propel him to the White House.

On his visit to Ohio, Biden will deliver a speech in Toledo aimed at undermining what polls show is Trump’s last great strength, the view by some voters that the former real estate entrepreneur manages the economy better.

Biden will also attend a voting event in Cincinnati, his campaign said.

Trump has withdrawn his advertising in Ohio in recent days, while Biden has increased his, another sign of the opportunity he and his fellow Democrats see to make more states competitive than they initially envisioned.