Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility
Lawmakers Who Met With Giuliani Scramble After COVID News
gvw_ap_news
By Associated Press
Published 4 years ago on
December 8, 2020

Share

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump said Monday his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani was “doing very well” after being hospitalized with the coronavirus as lawmakers in battleground states that Giuliani visited last week scrambled to make sure they did not contract the virus.

The 76-year-old former New York mayor, hospitalized in Washington, had traveled extensively to battleground states to press Trump’s quixotic effort to get legislators to overturn his election loss to Joe Biden and subvert the November vote. On numerous occasions, Giuliani met with officials for hours at a time without wearing a mask, including hearings last week with state lawmakers in Arizona, Georgia and Michigan.

Fallout from Giuliani’s diagnosis continued Monday as the Michigan House announced it had canceled its voting session scheduled for Tuesday. Giuliani spoke for hours last week before a Republican-led committee in Lansing investigating alleged election irregularities.

Michigan’s move came after the Arizona legislature announced Sunday that it would close for a week out of an abundance of caution “for recent cases and concerns relating to COVID-19.”

“Multiple representatives have requested time to receive results from recent COVID-19 tests before returning to session, out of an abundance of caution,” Michigan House Speaker Lee Chatfield, a Republican who met with Giuliani before the hearing, said in a statement. “The CDC guidelines would not consider them close contacts with anyone, even if Mayor Giuliani had been positive, but they want to go above and beyond in the interest of public safety. With the recent spike in COVID cases nationwide, this makes sense.”

The health department in Ingham County, where Lansing is located, said several people who attended the Michigan committee meeting with Giuliani on Wednesday must quarantine at least through Saturday. Health officer Linda Vail said she consulted with the state health department, which agrees that “it is extremely likely that Giuliani was contagious during his testimony.”

In Georgia, state Sen. William Ligon Jr., chairman of the subcommittee Giuliani testified before, urged those who had come in close contact with Giuliani “to take every precaution and follow all requisite guidelines to ensure their health and safety.” Giuliani on Thursday attended a hearing at the Georgia Capitol, where he went without a mask for several hours. Several state senators, all Republicans, also did not wear masks at the hearing. The Georgia legislature is not currently in session.

Trump, who announced Giuliani’s positive test in a Sunday afternoon tweet, told reporters he spoke with Giuliani on Monday. Giuliani was exhibiting symptoms when he was admitted to Georgetown University Medical Center on Sunday, according to a person familiar with the matter who was not authorized to comment publicly.

At Wednesday’s 4-1/2-Hour Hearing in Lansing, Giuliani Did Not Wear a Mask

“Rudy’s doing very well,” Trump said Monday. “I just spoke to him. No temperature.”

At Wednesday’s 4-1/2-hour hearing in Lansing, Giuliani did not wear a mask; nor did lawyer Jenna Ellis, who was sitting next to him. He asked one of his witnesses, a Detroit election worker, if she would be comfortable removing her mask, but legislators said they could hear her.

Giuliani traveled last Monday to Phoenix, where he met with Republican legislators for an hourslong hearing in which he was maskless. The Arizona Republican Party tweeted a photo of Giuliani and several state GOP lawmakers standing shoulder-to-shoulder and maskless.

The Trump campaign said in a statement that Giuliani tested negative twice before his visits to Arizona, Michigan and Georgia. Unidentified Trump team members who had close contact with Giuliani are in self-isolation.

“The Mayor did not experience any symptoms or test positive for COVID-19 until more than 48 hours after his return,” according to the statement. “No legislators in any state or members of the press are on the contact tracing list, under current CDC Guidelines.”

Georgia state Sen. Jen Jordan, a Democrat who attended Thursday’s hearing, expressed outrage after learning of Giuliani’s diagnosis.

“Little did I know that most credible death threat that I encountered last week was Trump’s own lawyer,” Jordan tweeted. “Giuliani — maskless, in packed hearing room for 7 hours. To say I am livid would be too kind.”

The diagnosis comes more than a month after Trump lost reelection and more than two months after Trump himself was stricken with the virus in early October. Since then, a flurry of administration officials and others in Trump’s orbit have also been sickened, including White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and Ben Carson, the secretary of housing and urban development. The president’s wife, Melania Trump, and teenage son, Barron Trump, also contracted the virus.

The extraordinary spread in Trump’s orbit underscores the cavalier approach the Republican president has taken to a virus that has now killed more than 282,000 people in the U.S. alone.

Those infected also include the White House press secretary and advisers Hope Hicks and Stephen Miller, as well as Trump’s campaign manager and the chair of the Republican National Committee.

DON'T MISS

Automakers to Trump: Please Require Us to Sell Electric Vehicles

DON'T MISS

President Biden Welcomes 2024 NBA Champion Boston Celtics to White House

DON'T MISS

Ohtani Makes History With 3rd MVP, Judge Claims 2nd AL Honor

DON'T MISS

Trump Chooses Pam Bondi for Attorney General Pick After Gaetz Withdraws

DON'T MISS

Average Rate on a 30-Year Mortgage in the US Rises to Highest Level Since July

DON'T MISS

Cutting in Line? American Airlines’ New Boarding Tech Might Stop You at Now Over 100 Airports

DON'T MISS

MLB Will Test Robot Umpires at 13 Spring Training Ballparks Hosting 19 Teams

DON'T MISS

Death Toll in Gaza From Israel-Hamas War Passes 44,000, Palestinian Officials Say

DON'T MISS

Jussie Smollett’s Conviction in 2019 Attack on Himself Is Overturned

DON'T MISS

Fresno Council Lowers Speed Limits on Friant and Audubon

UP NEXT

Bomb Cyclone Kills 1 and Knocks Out Power to Over Half a Million Homes Across the Northwest US

UP NEXT

Volunteers Came Back to Nonprofits in 2023, After the Pandemic Tanked Participation

UP NEXT

New Study: Proposed Trump Tariffs Could Cost US Consumers $78 Billion a Year

UP NEXT

Riders Stuck in Midair for Over 2 Hours on Knott’s Berry Farm Ride

UP NEXT

Shouting Racial Slurs, Neo-Nazi Marchers Shock Ohio’s Capital

UP NEXT

More Logging Is Proposed to Help Curb Wildfires in the US Pacific Northwest

UP NEXT

Scientists Fear What’s Next for Public Health if RFK Jr. Is Allowed To ‘Go Wild’

UP NEXT

Warren Slams Biden Admin for Failing to Hold Israel Accountable on Gaza Aid

UP NEXT

Suicides in the US Military Increased in 2023, Continuing a Long-Term Trend

UP NEXT

New FDA Rules for TV Drug Ads: Simpler Language and No Distractions

Trump Chooses Pam Bondi for Attorney General Pick After Gaetz Withdraws

46 minutes ago

Average Rate on a 30-Year Mortgage in the US Rises to Highest Level Since July

1 hour ago

Cutting in Line? American Airlines’ New Boarding Tech Might Stop You at Now Over 100 Airports

1 hour ago

MLB Will Test Robot Umpires at 13 Spring Training Ballparks Hosting 19 Teams

2 hours ago

Death Toll in Gaza From Israel-Hamas War Passes 44,000, Palestinian Officials Say

2 hours ago

Jussie Smollett’s Conviction in 2019 Attack on Himself Is Overturned

2 hours ago

Fresno Council Lowers Speed Limits on Friant and Audubon

2 hours ago

How About an Honest Conversation About the Range of Light Monument Proposal?

3 hours ago

UConn Coach Geno Auriemma Breaks NCAA Wins Record With 1,217th Victory

4 hours ago

Fresno Doctors Will Pay $2.4 Million to Settle Kickback Allegations, DOJ Says

4 hours ago

Automakers to Trump: Please Require Us to Sell Electric Vehicles

Three of the nation’s largest automakers, Ford, General Motors and Stellantis, are strategizing with other car manufacturers on how to make ...

46 seconds ago

President Joe Biden with Mary Barra, the chief executive of General Motors, at the Detroit Auto Show, Sept. 14, 2022. President-elect Donald Trump has promised to erase the Biden administration’s tailpipe rules designed to get carmakers to produce electric vehicles, but most U.S. automakers want to keep them. (Doug Mills/The New York Times)
46 seconds ago

Automakers to Trump: Please Require Us to Sell Electric Vehicles

5 minutes ago

President Biden Welcomes 2024 NBA Champion Boston Celtics to White House

25 minutes ago

Ohtani Makes History With 3rd MVP, Judge Claims 2nd AL Honor

Former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, speaks before Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump arrives to speak at a campaign rally at First Horizon Coliseum, Saturday, Nov. 2, 2024, in Greensboro, NC. (AP/Alex Brandon)
46 minutes ago

Trump Chooses Pam Bondi for Attorney General Pick After Gaetz Withdraws

1 hour ago

Average Rate on a 30-Year Mortgage in the US Rises to Highest Level Since July

1 hour ago

Cutting in Line? American Airlines’ New Boarding Tech Might Stop You at Now Over 100 Airports

2 hours ago

MLB Will Test Robot Umpires at 13 Spring Training Ballparks Hosting 19 Teams

2 hours ago

Death Toll in Gaza From Israel-Hamas War Passes 44,000, Palestinian Officials Say

Help continue the work that gets you the news that matters most.

Search

Send this to a friend