According to CNN, President Donald Trump’s pick to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg — Judge Amy Coney Barrett — was diagnosed with the Coronavirus earlier this summer and has since made an apparent full recovery. According to one of CNN’s sources, Barrett felt “a little under the weather but recovered.” At the time, Amy’s husband, Jesse, also tested positive for the Coronavirus, but he was apparently asymptomatic, unlike his wife. On Friday, Judge Barrett tested negative for the Coronavirus in the aftermath of the revelation that President Donald Trump himself contracted the virus.
Barrett was last with Trump last Saturday at a Rose Garden event that had been called for the president to formally roll out her Supreme Court nomination. Utah’s Republican Senator Mike Lee was also at that weekend event, and he announced on Friday that he, too, had tested positive for the Coronavirus. He met with Barrett on Tuesday, but since, again, the judge tested negative for the virus on Friday, that meeting may have been Coronavirus transmission-free.
Sen. Lee is a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is set to begin hearings handling Barrett’s nomination on October 12. For now, Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) says that these hearings are “on track” to continue as planned.
Via pool report, Trump is going to Walter Reed. Two sources familiar with the plan say he's expected to undergo tests.
— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) October 2, 2020
A number of prominent Republicans — including the president himself — are, due to their age, in a high-risk group when it comes to Coronavirus complications. On Friday, the news broke that Trump was going to Walter Reed Medical Center, but the move was characterized as a “precaution” in order to allow for tests and “immediate treatment” if required. Shortly before that news broke, White House physician Dr. Sean Conley released a Friday afternoon statement insisting that the president was “fatigued” but “in good spirits.” In the hours before Conley’s statement, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows said that the president had only “mild symptoms.”
