Our new book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics. Among other things, it discusses the politics of COVID.
Mark Meadows recently revealed that Trump tested positive for COVID on September 26, 2020. Ashley Parker and Josh Dawsey at WP:
From the day he tested positive until his hospitalization, Trump came in contact with more than 500 people, either those in proximity to him or at crowded events, not including rallygoers, according to a Washington Post analysis of the president’s interactions during that period.
That seven-day window reveals a president and chief of staff who took a reckless, and potentially dangerous, approach to handling the coronavirus, including Trump’s own positive test.
Trump and Meadows hid Trump’s positive test not just from the public, but also from his inner circle and from his top public health officials. He took part in a debate with Democratic rival Joe Biden three days later, never revealing the test result to Biden or event organizers.
And Trump took no extra precautions, such as mask-wearing or social distancing, to protect those he came in contact with in the days following the positive test.
By the end of October, more than two dozen people in Trump’s orbit would test positive for the coronavirus.
According to the official narrative of the Trump White House, the president first tested positive for the virus on the evening of Thursday, Oct. 1, and was taken by helicopter to Walter Reed less than 24 hours later. But medical experts say that a more likely time frame is at least a week between an initial positive test and a patient requiring hospitalization.
