Coronavirus: Trump’s Secret Service to finally wear masks amid White House outbreak as adviser admits it’s ‘scary’ going to work there

Economist Kevin Hassett conceded ‘I’d be a lot safer I was sitting at home’

Reports say that members of the US Secret Service who serve with the president and close to the Oval Office may be obliged to wear masks to protect themselves and their charge from the risk of coronavirus infection – even as the president himself refuses to be seen wearing a mask himself.

The news comes as one of Donald Trump’s advisers, Kevin Hassett, spoke frankly of the worry he feels from working in the White House, whose cramped quarters and inevitable need for close collaboration make social distancing close to impossible.

With one of Mr Trump’s valets and Mike Pence’s press secretary Katie Miller both testing positive in recent days, more than 30 members of the Secret Service are known to have contracted it. The tests have added to concerns that the White House staff, including the president himself, are increasingly at risk of infection while working in an environment that makes social distancing very difficult.

Interviewed on CBS’s Face the Nation, economic adviser Mr Hassett conceded that working in the White House at the moment is “scary”, but that the duty of public service demands it.

“I think that I’d be a lot safer if I was sitting at home than I would be going to the West Wing. But, you know, it’s the time when people have to step up and serve their country.

“You’ve been in the West Wing. You know, it’s a small, crowded place. It’s a little bit risky. But you have to do it because you have to serve your country. And there are a lot of things that you can’t do except there. Like if you’re going to have secure communications, you need to be in the Situation Room.”

Mr Hassett served as Mr Trump’s chief economist for the first two years of his administration, and recently returned to provide advice in a personal capacity during the coronavirus epidemic.

Besides having the Secret Service potentially wear masks, other new measures are being taken to keep the White House safe, including daily testing for an expanded number of staff. Three members of Mr Trump’s coronavirus task force, including Dr Anthony Fauci, have already decided to self-isolate in case they have been exposed.

The wearing of face masks in public has become a political bone of contention in recent weeks, with some on the right – including members of Congress – scorning instructions to wear them, complaining of government overreach based on what they think of as equivocal science.

The president’s Democratic challenger, Joe Biden, said last week that he wears a mask around his own secret service detail. By contrast, Mr Trump has reportedly told aides he would rather not wear a mask because it would signal he is preoccupied with health instead of being focused on saving the economy, as well as worrying that he might look ridiculous.

He was recently ridiculed for not wearing a mask while touring an Arizona factory that produces them, as was Mike Pence after he walked barefaced around the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota.