Claiming COVID-19 immunity, Trump hits the election trail again
13 October, 2020
US President Donald Trump will launch a campaign marathon Monday, holding rallies in three key swing states over the next couple of days as his White House race against surging rival Joe Biden enters its critical final weeks.
The Republican leader will hold a rally in Florida, accompanied by Pennsylvania and Iowa -- states all imperative to clinching a victory on November 3.
Trump will likely try to galvanize his electoral base by touting his nominee for Supreme Court justice, Amy Coney Barrett.
The Republican-controlled Senate will get started hearings for the 48-year-old judge, whose confirmation -- of which there is little doubt -- will shift the country's highest court firmly to the proper for generations.
Trump's doctors gave him the all-clear Saturday to return to the campaign trail after he was ruled no more a coronavirus transmission risk, and on Sunday he said while calling directly into a campaign event that he tested "totally negative."
But he has yet to be declared virus-free, and his immunity claim is unproven.
"It looks like I'm immune for, I have no idea, maybe a long time and maybe a short while, it could be a lifetime, nobody really knows, but I'm immune," Trump told the Fox News show "Sunday Morning Futures."
"The term 'immunity' means something, having a really protective glow."
"So now you have a president who does not have to cover up in a basement like his opponent," Trump added -- in a jab at Democratic challenger Biden, who has taken an even more cautious approach to campaign through the pandemic.
But it isn't yet clear from what degree contracting Covid-19 confers immunity, with early studies suggesting a couple of months while newer ones have indicated it might last longer.
Twitter on Sunday hid a tweet from Trump in which he claimed he was immune, saying the post violated its rules about misleading and potentially harmful misinformation.
The tweet was still noticeable once users clicked through the warning.
Trailing in polls
Trump, 74, was treated with an experimental antibody cocktail created by Regeneron that can provide immunity for just a few months when taken as cure instead of as a vaccine.
"Occasionally, vaccines can last for many years. (But) if you obtain it in the type of natural immunity, that isn't known yet," Regeneron CEO Leonard Schleifer told CBS's "Face the Nation" on Sunday.
"If you obtain it in our vial, in the event that you will, that's probably going to last you for months."
Badly trailing Biden with just weeks until the November 3 vote, Trump has been counting the times until he can hit the trail again.
During his phone interview on Fox News, Trump suggested that his White House rival could himself be sick.
"If you look at Joe, he was coughing yesterday horribly and grabbing his mask, as he's coughing," Trump said. "And I don't know very well what that was all about, and it didn't get much press."
'Never endorsed a candidate'
The Biden campaign has been publishing daily coronavirus tests because of their 77-year-old prospect since Trump tested positive on October 1 -- landing him in a military hospital for three nights and derailing his campaign.
There's been less transparency surrounding Trump's own state of health, with his medical team repeatedly refusing to state when he last tested negative for the virus. Which has fueled suspicion that he might not exactly have been tested for several days ahead of his diagnosis.
Covid-19 has killed a lot more than 214,000 people in the United States, however the president has urged Americans not to fear the virus.
A reelection ad that lauds Trump's handling of the outbreak was criticized by top government scientist Anthony Fauci, who said a clip was edited to create him seem to endorse the president's response to the pandemic.
"In my practically five decades of public service, I've never publicly endorsed any political candidate," Fauci, the longtime director of the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases, said in a statement sent to AFP.
Trump defended the clip, and his handling of the pandemic, and rebutted the doctor's criticism.
"They are indeed Dr. Fauci's own words. We've done a 'phenomenal' job, according to certain governors," the president wrote in a tweet.
Biden has slammed Trump's coronavirus response, on Sunday tweeting: "In January, I said President Trump was the worst possible leader to cope with a public health crisis. And everything we've been through in the months since has confirmed that to be true."
Barack Obama's former vice-president happens to be close to 10 points ahead in national polls with a good lead in a few key battleground states.
Source: