How did contagion reach the pinnacle of U.S. government?

Virus spread in White House with culture of invincibility

WASHINGTON — The ceremony in the White House Rose Garden on Sept. 26 was a triumphant flashback to the “before” times — before public health guidelines restricted mass gatherings, before people were urged to wear masks and socially distance.

President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump welcomed more than 150 guests as the president formally introduced Judge Amy Coney Barrett, his nominee for the Supreme Court. A handful of Republican senators were there, including Mike Lee of Utah, who hugged and mingled with guests. So was Kellyanne Conway, the recently departed senior counselor to the president, as well as the Rev. John Jenkins, the president of the University of Notre Dame, who left his Indiana campus where a coronavirus outbreak had recently occurred to celebrate an alumna’s nomination.

Spirits were high. Finally, Trump was steering the national discussion away from the coronavirus pandemic — which had already killed more than 200,000 people in the United States and was still raging — to more favorable terrain, a possible conservative realignment of the Supreme Court.

Attendees were so confident that the contagion would not invade their seemingly safe space at the White House that, according to Jenkins, after guests tested negative that day they were instructed they no longer needed to cover their faces. The no-mask mantra applied indoors as well. Cabinet members, senators, Barrett family members and others mixed unencumbered at tightly packed, indoor receptions in the White House’s Diplomatic Room and Cabinet Room.

Five days later, that feeling of invincibility was cruelly punctured. On Thursday, counselor to the president Hope Hicks, who reported feeling symptoms during a trip with the president to Minnesota on Wednesday, tested positive for the virus.

Early Friday, Trump announced that he and the first lady also had tested positive.

The White House outbreak thrust Washington into a state of heightened alarm Friday, with uncertainty one month before the election about the health of the president, whose age of 74, as well as additional co-morbidities — obesity, high cholesterol and slightly elevated blood pressure — increase his risks of a negative outcome.

Though White House officials have begun contact tracing to try to identify the origin of the outbreak, it is not publicly known whether the Rose Garden announcement of Barrett’s nomination was a superspreader event.

Still, the jarring contrast between the carefree, cavalier attitude toward the virus on display in the Rose Garden on Saturday and the pernicious awakening that occurred Thursday night resembles a Shakespearean tragedy.

The White House’s handling of the period between the first known symptoms — those of Hicks on Wednesday — and the president’s infection, which was confirmed about 1 a.m. Friday, is what experts considered a case study in irresponsibility and mismanagement.

Administration officials at first were not transparent with the public, and have not been forthcoming with detailed information about Trump’s condition since. Meadows told reporters Friday morning only that Trump was experiencing “mild symptoms” and would not elaborate on what those symptoms were.

“I’m not going to get into any particular treatment that he may or may not have,” Meadows said.

On Friday afternoon, the White House distributed a memorandum by White House physician Sean Conley describing Trump as “fatigued but in good spirits.” Though Conley listed the drugs he had administered, he provided to the public no measurements of the president’s condition, nor did he nor any other knowledgeable source submit to questions from journalists.

Inside the West Wing’s narrow corridors, where staffers for months have worked in proximity largely without masks, what had long been an atmosphere of invincibility turned into one of apprehension and panic. “People are losing their minds,” said the outside adviser.

First, aides fretted about their own risks of exposure. If the president got infected, so might they.

Then they considered the political implications, coming so close to the Nov. 3 election. “We don’t want to be talking about coronavirus, and now we’re talking about coronavirus,” the outside adviser said. “The hit writes itself: ‘He can’t protect the country. He couldn’t even protect himself.’ ”

Then they considered the reality that the president could actually get very sick.

Trump was unusually quiet Friday, not appearing before cameras nor even calling into Fox News Channel by phone, as he does from time to time.

Vice President Mike Pence, whose doctor said he tested negative for the virus Friday morning, worked from his residence at the Naval Observatory for the day. But other White House officials did not take the same precautions.

Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, the president’s daughter and son-in-law who both are senior advisers and have interacted with Trump and Hicks this week, tested negative on Friday, said White House spokeswoman Carolina Hurley. But she declined to answer questions about whether the two planned to self-isolate, and Kushner was seen at work in the White House on Friday.

Meadows, who also has had regular interaction with Trump and Hicks, did not wear a mask when he briefed reporters outdoors Friday morning. Asked why, the chief of staff responded defensively, “I’ve obviously been tested. We’re hopefully more than 6 feet away.”

It was unclear where or how Trump contracted the virus, but his travel schedule has been robust all week. He visited five states between Sunday and Monday and interacted with hundreds of individuals.

The first sign of symptoms inside the presidential bubble came on Trump’s trip Wednesday to Minnesota, where he attended a campaign fundraiser in Shorewood and an evening rally in Duluth.

Hicks, who spends more time with the president than most staffers, tested negative for the coronavirus on Wednesday morning, but started to feel ill during the Minnesota trip. She self-isolated aboard Air Force One for the flight home that night, although some other aides on the trip were unaware she had done so. Hicks took another test Thursday morning, and the results came back positive.

Meanwhile, Trump’s voice sounded raspy at times during his rally performance in Duluth, and he delivered a shorter speech than is typical, clocking in at 46 minutes compared to other recent rally speeches that have stretched well past an hour.

On Thursday, Hicks’ diagnosis was kept secret from the public and even from some of her own colleagues. Press secretary Kayleigh McEnany did not know Hicks had the virus when she briefed reporters about 11 a.m. but learned midafternoon, as the president was preparing to depart for another campaign fundraiser, this one at his private golf club in Bedminster, N.J.

By then, word about Hicks’ condition had begun spreading among Trump aides. Some staffers suddenly started wearing masks, a sign that something was amiss. A few senior aides were pulled from the Bedminster trip, including McEnany, who had been around Hicks extensively that week and was replaced by one of her deputies, Judd Deere.

Other aides on the trip were Johnny McEntee, Tony Ornato and Brian Jack. None wore a mask on Air Force One, but they did aboard Marine One, considering the helicopter has far tighter quarters than the airplane.

“Trump thought he could go to the fundraiser and keep it secret that Hicks had it,” Republican donor Dan Eberhart said.

Trump’s decision to proceed with the fundraiser after the known infection of Hicks, someone with whom he had extended recent close contact, went against the recommendations of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other public health authorities.

“They knew she was positive and they still let Marine One take off with the president. Why didn’t they ground him? That was the break in protocol,” said Kavita Patel, a practicing physician and former health adviser in the Obama White House. “The CDC’s protocol clearly states that as soon as anybody, i.e. Hope Hicks, was confirmed positive, anybody she came into close contact with for at least 48 hours prior should have at least isolated.”

In Bedminster, Trump held a roundtable fundraiser indoors where donors were sitting around the table with him. Masks were not worn in the room. The president then went outdoors to address a larger group, and some of those attendees wore masks, people present said.

Many of the attendees were elderly, a mix of real estate figures and Trump friends, including Keith Frankel, a vitamins executive who had worked with Trump on hydroxychloroquine, an anti-malarial drug Trump had falsely touted as a coronavirus cure.

In another breach of standard protocol for controlling the spread of the virus, not everyone who had come into contact with the president was immediately notified by the White House’s contact tracers.

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who had been helping Trump with debate preparation earlier this week, said Friday afternoon that he had not been contacted. In addition, at least one journalist who tested positive after traveling with the president this week also had not heard from the White House as of Friday afternoon.