Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
How Did Trump Get Infected? He Points To Military Families. Their Tests Are Negative.
President Trump suggested he contracted the coronavirus from families of fallen service members at a White House event, but the president didn鈥檛 offer any proof from contact tracing or genetic analysis and the White House later backed away from his remarks amid criticism. Trump made the comments during a Thursday interview with the Fox Business Network鈥檚 Maria Bartiromo. The event with the Gold Star families took place on Sept. 27, the day after more than a hundred people also gathered at the White House, many without masks, to mark Trump鈥檚 nomination of Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court. (Sonne, 10/8)
A growing list of attendees to a reception last month for President Trump's Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett have tested positive for coronavirus. But the next day, the annual Gold Star Mother's Day event was held indoors at the White House, and official photos from the reception show very few people wearing masks. Gold Star Mother's Day has been around since the 1930s, but was highlighted recently by Presidents Obama and Trump with White House receptions. Despite this year's event landing in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the White House decided not to cancel it. President Trump says when he met these family members and heard their stories, he couldn't bear to keep them at arms-length. (Lawrence, 10/8)
The families who attended a White House event honoring the loss of a member of the military are all doing well and do not have COVID-19, the organization that arranged their trip said Thursday after President Donald Trump suggested he might have been infected at that event. ... But the families so far are doing well, said Timothy Davis, the chief executive officer of The Greatest Generation Foundation, which sponsored their travel to the White House ceremony. 鈥淎ll of our Gold Star families have had a post-test conducted. All negative,鈥 he said in a statement to McClatchy. (10/8)
Top congressional Democrats condemned President Donald Trump on Thursday after the commander in chief suggested that he might have contracted Covid-19 from Gold Star family members who were too close to him when telling stories of their loved ones who died in the line of duty. Democrats said Trump's comments, made in an interview with Fox Business Thursday morning, disrespected military families and shifted blame for his administration's shortcomings on the coronavirus. (Forgey and O'Brien, 10/8)
