This is a developing story this morning and who knows what twists and turns lie ahead. I'll post interesting things as I see them, starting with this:
At about 9:15 this morning, the CNN bottom-of-screen crawler said this:
National Security Council ordered masks for White House grounds back in February, but was met with sharp directive that masks were not "a good look," multiple officials tell CNN. "If you have the whole west wing running around wearing masks, it wasn't a good look," one admin official recalls of [the] directive that came down after some NSC staffers were told to wear masks. [The] west wing wanted to "portray confidence and make the public believe there was absolutely nothing to worry about," the official says, revealing for [the] first time the image-conscious reason for early opposition to masks within [the] White House. In late January when [the] U.S. confirmed several coronavirus cases, west wing staff often told others in the administration that this was nothing to worry about, one former official says; staffers were repeatedly told in internal White House meetings that the virus had been "contained" because there were only 15 cases at the time. One former admin official laments setbacks the early masks opposition dealt U.S. coronavirus response, telling CNN "we lost so much time... this could have been so different."
Several minutes later, there was this:
Trump has several risk factors for more severe Covid-19 symptoms. He is 74, falling in [the] age range that faces five times greater risk of hospitalization and 90 times greater risk of death from the virus compared to young adults, [the] CDC says. Men are also more likely to die from coronavirus, and Trump is considered obese, which triples risk of hospitalization from Covid-19, CDC says. In 2018, one test indicated Trump had moderate heart disease. Not everything about Trump's health is known: [the] president made [a] relatively secret visit to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center last November, though [the] White House press secretary said the unannounced trip was to begin portions of his routine annual physical exam.
It's going to be an interesting day.
Update: Speaking of twists and turns, several people in my Twitter timeline were pointing out that Donald's illness is a distraction from the "Kimberly" situation. I assumed that meant Kimberly Guilfoyle, a.k.a. Don Jr.'s girlfriend, but I hadn't heard anything specific about her since her weird speech at the Republican convention a few weeks ago. A quick Google search turned up this, from Jane Meyer, writing at The New Yorker:
As President Donald Trump heads into the 2020 elections, he faces a daunting gender gap: according to a recent Washington Post/ABC News poll, he trails Joe Biden by thirty percentage points among female voters. As part of his campaign, Trump has been doing all he can to showcase female stars in the Republican Party, from nominating Amy Coney Barrett for the Supreme Court to naming Kimberly Guilfoyle, the former Fox News host and legal analyst, his campaign’s finance chair. Guilfoyle, however, may not be an ideal emissary. In November, 2018, a young woman who had been one of Guilfoyle’s assistants at Fox News sent company executives a confidential, forty-two-page draft complaint that accused Guilfoyle of repeated sexual harassment, and demanded monetary relief. The document, which resulted in a multimillion-dollar out-of-court settlement, raises serious questions about Guilfoyle’s fitness as a character witness for Trump, let alone as a top campaign official.In the 2020 campaign, Trump has spotlighted no woman more brightly than Guilfoyle. She was given an opening-night speaking slot at the Republican National Convention. And this fall Guilfoyle, who is Donald Trump, Jr.,’s girlfriend, has been crisscrossing the country as a Trump surrogate, on what is billed as the “Four More Tour.” At a recent “Women for Trump” rally in Pennsylvania, Guilfoyle claimed that the President was creating “eighteen hundred new female-owned businesses in the United States a day,” and praised Trump for promoting school choice, which, she said, was supported by “single mothers like myself.”
Guilfoyle has maintained that her decision to move from television news to a political campaign was entirely voluntary. In fact, Fox News forced her out in July, 2018—several years before her contract’s expiration date. At the time, she was a co-host of the political chat show “The Five.” Media reports suggested that she had been accused of workplace impropriety, including displaying lewd pictures of male genitalia to colleagues, but few additional details of misbehavior emerged. Guilfoyle publicly denied any wrongdoing, and last year a lawyer representing her told The New Yorker that “any suggestion” she had “engaged in misconduct at Fox is patently false.” But, as I reported at the time, shortly after Guilfoyle left her job, Fox secretly paid an undisclosed sum to the assistant, who no longer works at the company. Recently, two well-informed sources told me that Fox, in order to avoid going to trial, had agreed to pay the woman upward of four million dollars.
Until now, the specific accusations against Guilfoyle have remained largely hidden. The draft complaint, which was never filed in court, is covered by a nondisclosure agreement. The former assistant has not been publicly identified, and, out of respect for the rights of alleged victims of sexual harassment, The New Yorker is honoring her confidentiality. Reached for comment, she said, “I wish you well. But I have nothing to say.”
and last year a lawyer representing her told The New Yorker that “any suggestion” she had “engaged in misconduct at Fox is patently false.” But, as I reported at the time, shortly after Guilfoyle left her job, Fox secretly paid an undisclosed sum to the assistant, who no longer works at the company. Recently, two well-informed sources told me that Fox, in order to avoid going to trial, had agreed to pay the woman upward of four million dollars.
Until now, the specific accusations against Guilfoyle have remained largely hidden. The draft complaint, which was never filed in court, is covered by a nondisclosure agreement. The former assistant has not been publicly identified, and, out of respect for the rights of alleged victims of sexual harassment, The New Yorker is honoring her confidentiality. Reached for comment, she said, “I wish you well. But I have nothing to say.”
As serious as the draft complaint’s sexual-harassment allegations were, equally disturbing was what the assistant described as a coverup attempt by Guilfoyle, whose conduct was about to come under investigation by a team of outside lawyers. In July, 2016, the network had hired the New York-based law firm Paul, Weiss to investigate sexual misconduct at the company, which, under the leadership of Roger Ailes, had a long history of flagrant harassment and gender discrimination. According to those familiar with the assistant’s draft complaint, during a phone call on August 6, 2017, she alleged that Guilfoyle tried to buy her silence, offering to arrange a payment to her if she agreed to lie to the Paul, Weiss lawyers about her experiences. The alleged offering of hush money brings to mind Trump’s payments to the porn star Stormy Daniels, in order to cover up his sexual impropriety. (Read the entire article here.)
Update #2: Josh Marshall, writing at Talking Points Memo, ponders the timeline of events:
Let’s review some key facts, as far as we presently know them.
The New Jersey Trip
Yesterday morning Hope Hicks received test results showing she was COVID positive. It’s not clear when the test was administered (we’ll get to that in a moment). But she received the confirmed positive test yesterday morning before Trump left for a campaign/fundraiser trip to New Jersey. On that trip Trump was frequently observed unmasked, including in an indoor roundtable meeting. He appears to have exposed dozens of people during that trip.
It is clear that the President’s medical staff and top staff (and almost certainly the President himself) knew before leaving on that trip that he had been exposed to COVID. But he went anyway and exposed dozens more.
That was at a minimum an act of gross irresponsibility.
As I’ll note in a moment it also suggests the strong possibility that the White House tried to keep the whole situation secret.
Who Infected Who and When?
Most people are assuming that Hicks infected President Trump. But based on what we know that’s not the only or even the most likely scenario. Indeed, their infections being discovered so close in time makes it probably more likely that some other person or persons infected both of them. But there are details here that don’t add up.
We’ve been led to believe that the President and the people around him are tested either daily or close to daily. The White House medical staff have both the rapid saliva tests which take on the order of 15 minutes or so and the PCR tests which a dedicated lab can turn around in something like an hour and a half. If these tests are being done that frequently there should never been more than hours between someone becoming virus positive (and thus infectious) and tripping off a test.
We know that you can be infectious before becoming symptomatic. Indeed there’s significant evidence that you’re more infectious before developing symptoms. But your infectiousness is about your viral load. A significant viral load should trip off a test.
But here’s the problem. We don’t just know Trump, Melania Trump and Hicks are COVID-positive. They all appear to be actively symptomatic, sick. Presumably their symptoms are currently mild. But it is unlikely that all three people reached viral levels capable of testing positive and became actively sick on the same day.
This throws into some question whether the top people at the White House, including the President, are actually being tested on a daily basis. It also suggests that these three and likely others have been infectious and possibly actively sick for a significant period of time. There’s some mix of failed surveillance and/or secrecy about what the surveillance has found.
Were They Keeping It a Secret?
A critical part of this equation is that the White House didn’t come forward with any of this. Jennifer Jacobs of Bloomberg News learned that Hicks had tested positive and reported that last night. That immediately focused attention on the President’s exposure and forced the overnight disclosure of his illness. Were they planning on disclosing that Hicks had tested positive? That is at best unclear. They hadn’t disclosed that Ronna McDaniel, the head of the RNC who met with Trump last week, tested positive. We just found that out this morning. And what about Trump himself? Trump had repeatedly traveled with Hicks. Her diagnosis Thursday morning should have led to President Trump’s being immediately tested and possibly diagnosed yesterday morning or at the latest in the afternoon. But news reports last night suggested – though without saying so directly – that they were being tested and waiting on results last night.
This timeline has serious holes in it.
This is a crisis situation. Things can get confused. And because it is a crisis situation we can’t assume that all the reporting we have is complete or entirely accurate. We can’t point with total confidence to the contradiction between two apparent facts. Because none of them are that certain. But there are lots of indications that the White House was trying to keep this information under wraps and possibly endangered the lives of numerous people in doing so, including that of the President himself and possibly his challenger Vice President Biden. (This is the article in its entirety.)
Some good news: It has now been announced that Joe and Jill Biden have both tested negative.
Update #3: This is from Vanity Fair; apparently Hope Hicks is "frustrated" with Donald for his cavalier approach to the virus:
The biggest unknown is the state of the president’s health. This morning the New York Times reported that Trump is exhibiting “coldlike symptoms.” Two Republicans in close contact with the White House told me that Trump’s symptoms have included a cough and fever. Melania is said to be asymptomatic. “They are worried about the president because of his age,” one of the sources said. Sources said Trump will likely want to be seen in public as soon as possible to blunt the narrative that he is sidelined by the virus he’s spent the last six months downplaying. “He’s going to want to get out there a lot sooner than people think,” the former official said. “But it will be hard to hide if he’s sick. Also, who will want to be in a room with him?” The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
Campaign advisers are also gaming out how Trump’s COVID diagnosis will play out with only 32 days left until the election. Sources I spoke with are doubtful the next two debates will happen. “There really can be nothing for 14 days. It’s as if the campaign ended yesterday,” a second former West Wing official told me. Republicans close to Trump are discussing what kind of message Trump should put out that might limit the political damage. “He could come out and say, ‘Look, I had COVID and it wasn’t that bad. It just shows that I’m strong and we should open up the country,’” the former West Wing official said. “He could make a mockery of it.”
Meanwhile, Hicks has experienced more pronounced symptoms than the president. Two sources said she has had a high fever and a cough, with one source adding she lost her sense of smell. Hicks is said to be frustrated with Trump for taking such a cavalier approach to the virus. She was one of the few West Wing staffers to wear a mask in meetings, which her colleagues chided her for. “She was made fun of because she wore a mask,” a friend said. Sources told me Hicks is also upset that news coverage has made it appear that she gave Trump the virus, when in fact no one knows where he got it. “It’s so unfair she’s sort of being blamed,” the friend told me.
Hicks did not respond to a request for comment. (This is the article in its entirety.)
Note: Apparently the fundraising message I posted was not authentic. Apologies, I've deleted it.
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