Mark Meadows Update on Donald Trump’s Condition & Economic Stimulus Transcript October 7

Mark Meadows: (00:00)
I’ve got to… If you all stay back, I’ll be glad to answer it.

Speaker 2: (00:05)
Are we going to see the President today and what precautions are being taken for people who do come in contact with him?

Mark Meadows: (00:10)
Yeah. Obviously with the President, he continues to work. We’ve got a number of safety protocols with full PPE, masks, goggles, and the like for any direct interaction with the President in those areas. We continue to have a number of areas where we have disinfectants for hard surfaces and the like. But the President continues to work. He’s in very good health. We’re pleased with his progress. I had a briefing last night with Doc Conley late last night and we’ll do so again this morning.

Speaker 2: (00:50)
Will we see the President today and is he going to go to the Oval?

Mark Meadows: (00:52)
His schedule right now is fluid. We’re looking at his prognosis from a health standpoint. He wanted to go to the Oval yesterday. If he decides to go to the Oval, we’ve got safety protocols there that are, not only from a PPE standpoint, but from a ventilation standpoint in the Oval where we can actually work to that end as well.

Speaker 3: (01:16)
Are stimulus negotiations on or off? It was kind of confusing with the President’s-

Mark Meadows: (01:19)
Well, the stimulus negotiations are off. Obviously we’re looking at the potential for standalone bills. There’s about 10 things that we agree on. And if the Speaker is willing to look at those things on a piece by piece basis, then we’re willing to look at it. It became very obvious over the last couple of days that a comprehensive bill was just going to get to a point where it didn’t have really much Republican support at all. It was more of a Democrat led bill, which would have been problematic more so in the Senate than in the House. Peter?

Peter: (01:55)
How did the White House failed to prevent this outbreak? And specifically, why didn’t the White House [inaudible 00:02:02] to mandate social distancing and mask wearing?

Mark Meadows: (02:05)
Well, we do mandate social distancing as much as practical and when we’re there obviously wearing masks when you can’t do that. And in private meetings, we try to do that. The other part of that is testing on a daily basis. With all the senior staff, we were testing on a daily basis. Those protocols and where this came from and how exactly it entered in allows us to look at a number of things that … I met with both our White House Medical Office yesterday, the CDC, as we’re working with both of those to try to figure out what are the safest practice. Was on the phone late last night with Dr. Birx.

Mark Meadows: (02:52)
We’ve taken a number of extra precautions here at the White House, and yet you still see whether they get infected or they’re an asymptomatic spreader that might’ve come in, we’ve got to look at it. But it also shows the very nature of this particular virus is even with some of your colleagues, a number of your colleagues who may wear masks religiously, they’ve come down with it. And so it makes us pivot back to one critical thing. We need to make sure that therapeutics and vaccines are what we focused on. The President wants to make sure that whatever drugs he was able to receive at Walter Reed, that all Americans can receive those drugs and has been laser-focused on that.

Peter: (03:36)
For clarity though, as we look at the Amy Coney Barrett event, you talked about we’ve done the best we can. We do a lot of testing. There was no social distancing, there were very few masks worn. And as you know, testing alone isn’t enough. So why didn’t you social distance there? Why didn’t everyone wear a mask?

Mark Meadows: (03:49)
Yeah. And so Peter, you’re drawing some assumptions from that event that we’re saying with the facts that we’re looking at may not actually meet that out. And I can tell you that we’re looking at it in a detailed manner, just because there were a number of people there that came down with it. We actually know that some of the infection here within the White House did not come from that event because of the number of people that we have. We know exactly, or we believe we know exactly where that infection came from. And so to do it from a causal standpoint and suggest that that was the cause would just not be accurate. I’ve got to run.

Speaker 5: (04:28)
[crosstalk 00:04:28] part of a negotiating position or did he really want to slam the door? Or was he expecting-

Mark Meadows: (04:38)
Yeah. I don’t know that there’s any negotiating position. I think the President’s tweet was recognizing what we all know right now is over the last several days, while we have been increasing our offers and actually looking at some of the ways to compromise, there hasn’t been the same kind of effort on the other side of it from the Speaker. And so to suggest to continue to go on with conversations that wouldn’t have the support in the Senate was really something that we couldn’t do.

Mark Meadows: (05:11)
I’ve got to run. I’ve got to run back. [crosstalk 00:05:14] I’ve tested negative every day, including today.

Speaker 3: (05:17)
Was the President tested negative?

Speaker 5: (05:19)
Mark, was the President tested daily before Thursday? [crosstalk 00:05:27] So we’ll attribute to you yes, tested daily before Thursday.

Speaker 6: (05:35)
Never answer that question.