White House SCOTUS announcement is suspected as Covid super-spreader event as video shows infected senator hugging attendees

Could Saturday’s Rose Garden event be the key to tracking spread?

It is looking increasingly possible that Saturday’s White House ceremony in which president Donald Trump named his nominee for the vacancy on the Supreme Court may have been a coronavirus superspreader event.

Video emerged on Friday of Republican Senator Mike Lee of Utah, who has since tested positive for the virus, enthusiastically hugging other attendees. He is also seen holding his mask in his hand.

Almost no one is seen wearing a mask at the Rose Garden announcement that Judge Amy Coney Barrett is nominated to the court.

Judge Barrett’s colleague, the president of Notre Dame Reverend John Jenkins has also tested positive. In an email to students, faculty, and staff, he wrote: “I regret my error of judgment in not wearing a mask during the ceremony and by shaking hands with a number of people in the Rose Garden.”

A Trump administration press staffer and a journalist have also tested positive, but are unidentified at present.

Health secretary Alex Azar was seen putting one on at one point during the speech, CNN reports. Attorney General William Barr and Dr Scott Atlas, the latest addition to the White House coronavirus taskforce, were also seen without masks and shaking hands with people.

The news that the president’s close adviser Hope Hicks had Covid-19 broke on Thursday evening, and overnight it was confirmed that both Trump and first lady Melania Trump were also positive.

Republican National Committee chair Ronna McDaniel tested positive earlier in the week and has been isolating at home since Saturday and so is not believed to have been at the Rose Garden event.

Judge Barrett and her husband both had Covid-19 over the summer but made full recoveries.

Covid-19 symptoms can take between two and 14 days to develop, the average being five days. Factoring in the schedules of the president, first lady, Ms Hicks, and Senator Lee over the past week creates a web of many dozens or even hundreds of people with whom they may have come into direct contact.

This potentially includes all of the attendees at the first presidential debate in Ohio; those that joined or met the president on trips to New Jersey and Minnesota; White House and Capitol Hill reporters; GOP senators, and the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Vice president Mike Pence and second Karen Pence have tested negative, as have former vice president Joe Biden and his wife Jill, and Senator Kamala Harris and her husband Doug Emhoff.

Just three days after the Rose Garden event, Trump met Biden for the socially-distanced first presidential debate.