Trump’s status causes concern
His chief of staff, doctors differ on his condition
WASHINGTON » President Donald Trump’s vital signs were “very concerning” over the past day and he is not out of danger, the White House chief of staff said Saturday, contradicting a rosier picture painted by the president’s doctors on television just minutes before.
While the doctors maintained that Trump was “doing ver y well” and in “exceptionally good spirits” after his first night in the hospital with the coronavirus, Mark Meadows, the chief of staff, provided a more sober assessment and warned that the next two days would be pivotal in determining the outcome of the illness.
“The president’s vitals over the last 24 hours were very concerning and the next 48 hours will be critical in terms of his care,” Meadows told reporters outside Walter Reed Medical Mili
tary Center, where the president was flown Friday evening and will remain for at least a few days. “We’re still not on a clear path to a full recovery.”
Meadows’ remarks were attributed to a person familiar with the president’s health in a pool report sent to White House journalists in keeping with ground rules that he set for the interview. But a video posted online captured Meadows approaching the pool reporters outside Walter Reed after the doctors’ televised briefing and asking to speak off the record, making clear who the unnamed source was.
The mixed messages, which came even as the virus spread to a widening swath of Trump’s allies, only exacerbated the confusion and uncertainties surrounding the president’s situation. During their briefing, the doctors refused to provide important details and gave timelines that conflicted with earlier White
House accounts, leaving the impression that the president was sick and began treatment earlier than officially reported.
Two people close to the White House said in separate interviews with The New York Times that the president had trouble breathing Friday and that his oxygen level dropped, prompting his doctors to give him supplemental oxygen while at the White House and transfer him to Walter Reed where he could be monitored with better equipment and treated more rapidly in case of trouble.
During the televised briefing, Dr. Sean P. Conley, the White House physician, said the president was not currently receiving supplemental oxygen Saturday but repeatedly declined to say definitively whether he had ever been on oxygen.
“None at this moment and yesterday with the team, while we were all here, he was not on oxygen,” he said, seeming to suggest that there was a period Friday at the White House when he was.
Conley likewise appeared to indicate that the president was first diagnosed with
the virus Wednesday rather than Thursday night when Trump disclosed that he had tested positive on Twitter. While describing what he said was the president’s progress, he said Trump was “just 72 hours into the diagnosis now,” which would mean midday Wednesday.
Asked about that, Conley did not clarify but said that Thursday afternoon “we repeated testing and, given clinical indications, had a little bit more concern.” Late that night, he said “we got the PCR confirmation that he was” positive. Trump attended campaign events on both Wednesday night and Thursday without wearing a mask and gathering hundreds of supporters who likewise were not taking precautions against the virus.
Dr. Brian Garibaldi, another physician treating the president, also said Trump had received an experimental antibody therapy “about 48 hours ago,” which would have been midday Thursday — before the confirmation test that Conley said came back positive that evening and a full day before the White House disclosed the
treatment Friday.
The confusion came from a briefing where Conley and his team offered a relentlessly positive assessment of Trump’s condition.
“This morning the president is doing very well,” Conley said. “At this time, the team and I are extremely happy with the progress the president has made.”
The doctors said Trump had been free of fever for 24 hours and had blood pressure and heart rates that were normal for him. Asked why he moved Trump to the hospital, Conley said, “Because he’s the president of the United States.”
Dr. Sean N. Dooley, another physician on the team, said Trump was feeling optimistic.
“He’s in exceptionally good spirits,” Dooley said.
He said the president told his doctors, “I feel like I could walk out of here today.”
Trump amplified that buoyant tone in a Twitter message Saturday afternoon. “Doctors, Nurses and ALL at the GREAT Walter Reed Medical Center, and others from likewise incredible institutions who have joined
them, are AMAZING!!!” he wrote. “Tremendous progress has been made over the last 6 months in fighting this PLAGUE. With their help, I am feeling well!”
Meadows later tried to walk back his earlier comments.
“The president is doing very well,” he told Reuters. “He is up and about and asking for documents to review. The doctors are very pleased with his vital signs. I have met with him on multiple occasions today on a variety of issues.”
The outbreak infected a third Republican senator Saturday as Ron Johnson of Wisconsin reported testing positive, as did former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, who helped prepare Trump for his campaign debate Tuesday. Other Republicans close to Trump were being tested and awaiting results as the weekend opened. In the course of barely 24 hours, the president, his wife, his campaign manager, his party chairperson, his senior adviser, his former counselor and now three Republican senators have all tested positive for the virus, along with several reporters.
The White House medical unit was investigating Trump’s announcement of his nomination of Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court last weekend as a likely source of the virus’s spread. More than a half- dozen people who attended the event Sept. 26 or were with the president on Air Force One flying to a campaign rally in Pennsylvania later in the evening have tested positive.
With the election just 30 days away, White House officials sought Saturday to project as much of a business-as-usual image as possible, insisting that the president can govern the country from his hospital bed and that there was no need to transfer power to Vice President Mike Pence. Even as doctors hovered over Trump, his staff Friday night issued a report on his buy-American drive and announced some minor appointments. Saturday morning, the White House announced that the president had signed two bills appointing members to the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution.