After he was hospitalized in Covid-19 before President Donald Trump’s first campaign rally, his physician released a memo on Monday stating that the president had recently undergone a negative test on consecutive days and was no longer contagious.
Questions have repeatedly been raised about whether Trump and the administration have repeatedly tested negative for the virus. White House physician Dr. Sean Conley said in his memo that several steps were taken to test Trump and that he tested negative on antigen tests rather than on the more crucial polymerase chain reaction test. Conley did not say on what days Trump tested negative.
“This comprehensive data, in pursuance of the CDC’s guidelines for eliminating transmission-based precautions, reveals our medical team’s assessment that the president is not contagious to others,” Conley said in the memo.
Trump returned to the campaign trail Monday night after he and several White House and campaign aides in Florida became infected with Covid-19. Florida is a decisive battlefield state, and the polls show that Democratic candidate Joe Biden is leading Trump, who won the state in 2016.
“They say I’m immune. I feel very powerful,” Trump told the crowd in Sanford. “I’ll go to that audience, I’ll go there, I’ll kiss everyone in that audience. I’ll kiss the guys and the beautiful women.”
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Biden held events in the Second War state of Ohio on Monday. Vice President Mike Pence was also campaigning in Ohio on Monday. Sen. of California, however. Kamala Harris, Biden’s running mate, was not on the trail instead of attending the trial as a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, confirming the trial of Supreme Court nominee Amy Connie Barrett.
Trump spent most of the day on Twitter after Democrats grilled Barrett about his views on the Affordable Care Act, which he argued Republicans were trying to overturn through court.
“Republicans should say out loud and clearly that we are going to provide better healthcare at a much lower cost. Get the word out! The pre-existing conditions will always be safe !!!” Trump wrote Twitter After the committee adjourned for an afternoon break.
Trump has long sought a health care plan to replace the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, but Republicans have failed to offer a plan that would protect pre-existing conditions. Trump-backed Republican law in 2017, which failed, includes a state amnesty that would allow insurers to charge higher prices for sick people.
