How the next few days will make or break his election
THE initial reports were conflicting and confused. Only a few minutes after President Trump’s medical team gave a bullish but suspiciously incomplete account of his health on Saturday, his chief of staff gravely told reporters it was much worse than the doctors had claimed.
‘The President’s vitals over the last 24 hours were very concerning,’ said Mark Meadows. ‘And the next 48 hours will be critical in terms of his care.’
The Trump administration hardly has a reputation for telling the unvarnished truth, so this sudden candour sounded to many like proof that the situation was serious in Mr Trump’s private rooms at the Walter Reed military hospital.
Forget his imminent return to the campaign trail: it now looked as if the President would be lucky to survive.
And even if he did pull through, it was most unlikely that he would be able to fight the presidential election in four weeks’ time.
And then, yesterday, at noon local time, the men in white coats appeared once again outside the hospital.
To begin with, White House doctor Sean Conley admitted that he was wrong in having said Mr Trump had not needed oxygen (which can indicate not only breathing problems but also potential lung damage). The doctor said he had been ‘trying to reflect the upbeat attitude’ of the President and his medical team. Now, however, the doctor could say in all honesty that – despite beginning steroid treatment for low oxygen levels – the President was improving so much that he might be released from hospital as early as today.
As for Mr Meadows’ warning, his comments had been ‘misconstrued’, added Dr Conley unconvincingly.
Whatever the true state of the President’s health, there is a growing belief that the next couple of days could well determine the final outcome of next month’s election.
For if Mr Trump can show that even he – 74, obese and a man (all factors that mitigate against those infected) – can shake off the coronavirus in just a few days, it might just win him another four years in the White House.
His months of downplaying the pandemic would no longer look like an electoral albatross hanging from his neck but vindication – at least to some voters – that he’d been right all along.
Even as they publicly wished Trump and wife Melania (also suffering from the virus) a speedy recovery, Democrats would privately much prefer him to take his time getting back on his feet. They have spent the
past few days pointing out that the President’s illness had been the worst thing that could have happened to him in the closing weeks of an election campaign.
NOT only, they noted, would it physically stop him going out on the trail – and he has, as ever, relied heavily on mass rallies around the country – but it restores coronavirus as the main election issue.
Research shows that voters’ biggest concern with mr Trump has been his handling of a pandemic which has so far claimed the lives of some 209,000 Americans. He was hoping to fight the election instead on signs of a recovering economy and the selection of a new judge for the Supreme Court.
However, if mr Trump can personally deal with the virus so well that he’s allowed home from hospital just two days after being admitted, it will be a victory on various fronts.
‘I had it and I beat it!’ – what a perfect slogan for his next mega-rally, which may now not be far off.
And, equally to the point, what more perfect opponent to use it against than Joe
Biden – almost four years older and looking distinctly pale and doddery as he has sheltered from the pandemic in his basement.
David gergen, an adviser to four presidents and seen as Washington’s most experienced political operator, was quick to see this threat and smell a possible rat.
Within minutes of yesterday’s press conference, mr gergen – no fan of mr Trump – was on Cnn warning that voters must have ‘full information’ about the President’s health before they vote.
Could the doctors, under pressure from the patient, still be putting a gloss on the true state of the President’s health? If they are, it’s a hugely risky strategy for mr Trump. Campaigning in the US is notoriously draining and requires a robust constitution. If he is seriously ill from the virus, he will soon be found out.
But desperate times may call for desperate measures: the latest national poll yesterday had Joe Biden nearly doubling his lead to 14 per cent since last Tuesday’s chaotic debate.
And recent history – namely Boris Johnson and Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro – suggests that leaders who catch the virus can expect an uptick in their approval ratings as the nation rallies round them.
BOLSONARO – who had a mild dose of the virus – did particularly well as he was able to claim from personal experience that few people who get infected end up dying.
of course, if mr Trump’s condition were to worsen, his opponents would surely point out that, even with an army of top doctors, and the most up-to- date drugs and treatments, nobody above a certain age can be sure they will fight off the disease.
And they might add: how can he claim to protect his country from the virus when he – sheltered like no other American – could not even protect himself?
As he sits in his hospital bed, glued as always to the TV, mr Trump knows that his physical health and his political health have never been so intertwined.