CNN Medical Analyst Excoriates Trump For Going to Debate After Testing Positive: He Was ‘Willing to Endanger the Life of Joe Biden’

CNN medical analyst Dr. Jonathan Reiner ripped into Donald Trump and those on his team who kept the former president’s coronavirus diagnosis a secret before his first 2020 debate with Joe Biden.

Reiner joined New Day on Wednesday to talk about the revelation from White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, who says in an upcoming book that Trump tested positive for Covid-19 just days ahead of his first confrontation with his eventual successor. Meadows adds Trump tested negative for Covid shortly after, but the former president was hospitalized for the disease following the debate, so the revelations invite questions about his health and the timeline of his diagnosis.

Asked for his thoughts, Reiner noted that the test also raises questions about whether Trump knew he was positive and carelessly risked spreading the disease to others.

“When it was announced that he tested positive two days after the debate, he was already quite sick, and was hospitalized the next day,” Reiner said. “Typically it takes about a week after someone tests positive for them to become ill enough to be hospitalized. But the really the big story to me is that the White House knew that the president was positive on Saturday, three days before the debate.”

The conclusion Reiner drew from Trump’s new timeline is that “the White House team, the president, his entire senior staff, were willing to endanger anyone and everyone in order to advance the president’s electoral chances.”

“The big picture is they were willing to endanger the life of Joe Biden and his team by having the president attend that event positive,” he said. John Berman expanded on that by noting Trump could’ve also passed the disease on to the gold star families and others who he came into contact with.

Reiner also directed his ire towards White House physician Sean Conley, who hedged last year when confronted with questions from the media about when Trump last tested negative for Covid.

“He knew that the president was positive. He should have prevented the debate from going forward, and if he had any honor, he would have resigned rather than let that go forward. Yet he kept that secret.”

Watch above, via CNN.