Trump Sat Next to Second Mar-a-Lago Coronavirus Patient but White House Doc Won’t Test Him
The White House doctor confirmed that another person who sat at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago table has tested positive but insisted the president did not need to be tested.
Tom Brenner/Reuters
A second person who dined with President Donald Trump at his Mar-a-Lago resort last weekend during a visit by Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has tested positive for COVID-19, according Trump’s physician Dr. Sean Conley.
The first person who interacted with the president was Fabio Wajngarten, a top communications aide to Bolsonaro who posed in photos next to Trump. A third person who was at Mar-a-Lago on Sunday for a Trump fundraiser has also tested positive but it’s unclear if the person came into contact with Trump, The Washington Post reported, citing an email from Republican Party officials.
The White House doctor insisted there was still no need to swab or quarantine the president. The president had earlier suggested that he would “most likely” be getting tested “fairly soon.”
The now toxic dinner took place last weekend when the Brazilian delegation visited the president’s Florida getaway. “This evening we learned of another dinner guest, this one sharing the table with the President and White House delegation, who was symptom-free until this morning and has since tested positive for COVID-19,” the statement from Conley said. “These interactions would be categorized as low risk for transmission.”
Conley added, citing guidelines the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have laid out, “As such, there is no indication for home quarantine at this time.”
Conley did not name the new dinner guest, but the Brazilian embassy to the U.S. on Saturday tweeted that Ambassador Nestor Forster tested positive. “Brazil's Chargé d'Affaires Ambassador Nestor Forster has learned tonight that he has tested positive for COVID-19,” the embassy wrote in a tweet. “Following medical advice, Amb. Forster will extend his self-quarantine, which he had already placed himself into as a precautionary measure, for another two weeks.”
As a standard measure of practice the World Health Organization has recommended that anyone coming into contact with a person testing positive for COVID-19 should self-quarantine for two weeks. Under those guidelines, the entire Mar-a-Lago staff and American delegation should isolate.
The Brazilian coronavirus cluster is not the only exposure the president has had to the contagious virus. He was also potentially exposed through several people who came in contact with a person who attended the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in National Harbor, Maryland, who later tested positive.
Forster, Wajngarten and Bolsonaro were part of a delegation who traveled to the U.S. over the weekend and met with multiple high-level officials. The group dined at Mar-a-Lago with Trump, National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien and Trump’s daughter and son-in-law, Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner.
On Sunday, the Brazilian delegation met with U.S. military Southern Command senior leaders. On Monday, the delegation met with Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) at the Hilton Miami Downtown. Scott said Thursday that he would be tested for COVID-19 and would self-quarantine for two weeks.
Miami Mayor Francis Suarez, who attended an event with Bolsonaro and his press secretary in Miami on Monday, told The Miami Herald on Friday that he had since tested positive for COVID-19.
The Miami Police Department’s entire motorcycle patrol unit said they would self-quarantine after escorting the delegation around Miami.