On Thursday morning, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows stepped in front of the cameras for a brief press event. Meadows managed to explain that Donald Trump was “awake and alert,” avoiding an Alexander Haig moment, but he also provided a timeline of events over the last three days that was outright shocking.
According to Meadows, Trump travelled to Minnesota on Wednesday accompanied by his usual entourage, including adviser Hope Hicks. Then, on Thursday morning, Hicks tested positive for COVID-19. Despite this result, and despite the fact that Trump and Hicks had spent time together just hours earlier, Trump went on to a New Jersey fundraiser on Thursday afternoon. It wasn’t until almost 11 PM on Thursday evening that Trump mentioned to Fox News that Hicks had tested positive and that he and Melania Trump were being tested. And finally, just before 1 AM, Trump tweeted to say that his test results were positive and that he would “begin recovery immediately.”
That timeline is shocking all on it’s own, because it says that Trump knew he had been exposed to someone with an active case of COVID-19, but continued to not just go out to large public gatherings, but do so without bothering to wear a mask. That means everyone who travelled with or interacted with Trump in New Jersey was exposed. All of those people should be self-isolating and seeking a test.
But what’s more frightening about this timeline is that it’s far from a complete description of what happened. There are also good reasons to think it is simply a lie.
One thing that’s very clear is that the White House kept the positive result from Hicks a secret. It wasn’t Trump’s tweet that broke the news to the nation, it was Bloomberg reporter Jennifer Jacobs, who released the information hours before Trump fessed up. Even then, it seems that Jacobs had known for some time, but held back to protect sources. That’s because, as Bloomberg reported after Trump’s own positive result was announced, “Only a very small circle of people knew that Hicks had tested positive, and senior staff had hoped to keep that information private...”
And the obvious response to that is … why? Why not report the result of Hicks’ test immediately so that everyone exposed in Minnesota—as well as everyone exposed during the previous day’s trip to the debate—could take appropriate action? Why keep any of this “private?”
The timeline, as it is being reported now, looks like this:
Tuesday
Trump’s team, including Hicks, travels to Cleveland to take part in the first debate. As Trump spews nonstop on stage for 90 minutes, a number of his family and staff defy debate and local rules by sitting in the audience without masks. Among others, Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump, Ivanka Trump, and Tiffany Trump all sat in a row without wearing masks.
Wednesday
Trump’s team flies to Minnesota for a rally. While at the rally, Hicks begins to feel ill. She isolates herself on the plane during the return trip.
Thursday
Hicks receives a positive test result. It’s not immediately clear whether this was a rapid test given on Thursday morning, or the result of a PCR test taken on Wednesday and processed overnight. In any case, a “small circle” of officials are told of Hicks’ results, but do not share this information generally. However, Trump is certainly aware of this result when he and Melania fly to a New Jersey fundraiser on Thursday afternoon. The entourage for this event does not include Hicks, but does include many of the same people who flew with them on Tuesday and Wednesday. It’s only after Trump returns to the White House, and after Jacobs’ reporting, that the news of Hicks’ test is released, followed by Trump’s late-night admission that he and Melania have also tested positive.
All of that is bad enough, and the list of people who might have been exposed because of the deliberate negligence of Trump and his staff is extensive. However, there are some … potential issues with even this patched together timeline. For example, here’s that line of people sitting front row for Donald Trump.
(From top) Eric Trump, Ivanka Trump, Melania Trump, Tiffany Trump, and Donald Trump Jr.
In the Trump family row, there is one person who has a mask: Melania. However, when the debate ends and Melania steps onto the stage beside Donald, she is suddenly maskless, even as Jill Biden keeps her mask on both in the audience and on stage.
There’s another strange indicator that came a day earlier. During the first group of coronavirus task force messages back in April and May, the White House installed multiple outdoor podiums so that speakers could stay well distanced during presentations. However, that arrangement was removed months ago after Trump’s speculations on injecting bleach cased the daily mini-rallies to come to an end. And then, on Monday ...
And reports suggest that it’s not just Hicks who was feeling poorly in advance of her test, because aides seemed to think that Trump was feeling unwell on Wednesday. He not only cut his rally that night short, he was reported to be “fatigued.”
All of this raises the question: How much of the timeline as it’s now being presented is true? The fact that there was a deliberate effort to keep the results of Hicks’ tests hidden suggest that, had it not been for that reporting, we still might not know of her positive results. And if those results had continued to be hidden, would Trump have admitted that he had also received a positive test?
Finally, symptoms usually develop two to 14 days after exposure to COVID-19. If Trump and everyone around him are actually being tested daily, how could he have been showing notable symptoms on Wednesday, but not received a positive test result until the wee hours of Friday? The actions taken in the last week—from the White House, to the debate, to the fundraiser, and after—suggest there is every reason to believe that Trump had at least been exposed well before Hicks’ test result. In fact, if both Hicks and Trump were displaying symptoms on Wednesday, their exposure could have been no later than Monday. If they had a known exposure by that time, it explains why Pence was distancing from Trump on that day.
What would be the most likely event for that exposure? There are two possibilities. The previous Friday evening, Trump was in Newport News, Virginia, for a rally. However, that rally was conducted at an airport, with Trump barely stepping away from Air Force One. It’s also notable that on that evening, Pence was right there with Trump, both of them maskless—a pretty good indicator that neither thought the other had been exposed at that point.
Trump and Pence at an airport rally in Newport News, Virginia, on Sept. 25.
Trump, Hicks, or any other member of the team may have been exposed on that evening, especially if they were mingling with the largely unmasked crowd. However, the next day presented another opportunity, because that was the day for a large, and largely mask-free, ceremony that involved a great deal of close-up contact.
Trump escorts Amy Coney Barrett to the Rose Garden on Sept. 26, 2020.
To introduce Amy Coney Barrett in his bid to fast-track a replacement for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Trump packed the Rose Garden with Republican supporters.
Amy Coney Barrett stands with her family onstage after a news conference where Trump announced Barrett as his nominee.
If this gathering was the source of infection for Trump’s team, then everyone else who was present—from Barrett to the Republican senators who are intent on voting her in—should also be considered exposed.
If Trump and Hicks were displaying symptoms on Wednesday, they both must have been exposed to COVID-19 no later than Monday. And the way that Trump and Pence distanced themselves on Monday afternoon suggests that by that point they were already aware that Trump had been exposed. In fact, by Monday afternoon, Trump may have tested positive, because if he was really getting a daily test, that result would have been expected before he began displaying symptoms on Wednesday.
The direct evidence shows that the news of Hope Hicks’ positive test result, and her earlier illness, were hidden from both the public and most people who were directly at risk from exposure. What the evidence strongly suggests is that Trump was infected days earlier than his test result, no later than Monday, which was the day before he snorted and shouted across from Biden for 90 minutes. Everything from the reappearance of the second White House podium to Melania’s mask-wearing suggests that a small number of Trump’s team was aware of the truth for days.
They just covered up the information, putting hundreds at risk and setting in motion chains of possible infection that could change everything from the election to the Supreme Court hearing.
