As Donald Trump spends his second night at Walter Reed Military Medical Center, the White House is scrambling to contain the biggest crisis of Trump’s presidency, 31 days until the election.
On Saturday, the West Wing plunged into damage-control mode after Trump’s physician, Dr. Sean Conley, told reporters that Trump was diagnosed with COVID-19 on Wednesday—a day earlier than Trump previously disclosed. The new timeline meant that Trump would have been contagious when he debated Joe Biden on Tuesday and attended a fundraiser on Thursday at his Bedminster golf club.
The White House’s shifting chronology and lack of transparency are being driven, in part, by Trump’s desire to conceal the seriousness of his illness from the public. Three sources said Trump argued with his doctors on Friday after they told him he needed to be moved to Walter Reed. “He didn’t want to go to the hospital a month before the election,” a Republican close to Trump told me. Two sources said doctors gave Trump an ultimatum: he could go to the hospital while he could still walk, or doctors would be forced to take him in a wheelchair or on a stretcher at a later point if his health deteriorated. “They told him, ‘You can go now or we’re taking you later and it’s non negotiable,’” a second source close to the White House said. Trump waited to leave for the hospital until the stock market closed on Friday, a source said.
After spending months denying the dangers of COVID-19, Trump is expressing an emotion aides have rarely seen: fear. On Friday, Trump grew visibly anxious as his fever spiked to 103 fahrenheit and he was administered oxygen at the White House, according to three Republicans close to the White House. Two sources told me Trump experienced heart palpitations on Friday night—possible side effects of the experimental antibody treatment he received. Trump has wondered aloud if he could defeat the disease. “Am I going out like Stan Chera?” Trump has asked aides, referring to his friend, New York real-estate developer Stan Chera, who died of COVID in April.
On Saturday, two sources said Trump was feeling better. But it is difficult to assess the information given the White House's history of lying. According to a source, Chief of Staff Mark Meadows has told Republicans that the next few days will be critical to determine the virus’s outcome. “Meadows has said if Trump can get out of the hospital by Tuesday, then he’s gone through the worst of it. But if he’s still there after Tuesday, the worst is yet to come,” the source told me.
Inside Trumpworld, the shock of Trump’s hospitalization is giving way to despair about his prospects in the upcoming election. “They all know it’s over,” a Republican close to the campaign said. “This is spiraling out of control,” a former West Wing official said. Some Trump allies are entertaining conspiracy theories that the White House outbreak was caused by someone with political motives. “It’s weird that all these Republicans are getting it,” a prominent Republican told me. “I don’t know what the fuck is going on. But one thing I’ve learned is: when something major happens thirty days before an election, it usually has to do with the election.” (There is no evidence for this wild claim).
Meanwhile, America’s closest allies are entertaining wild scenarios as well. An outside White House adviser told me that a high-level government official from a G-7 country asked him if Trump would try to appoint Ivanka president instead of Mike Pence. “He’s broken every norm so far, so they think anything is possible,” the source said.
The White House declined a request for comment.
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