3 years ago
White House physician Sean Conley said on Monday that President Donald Trump has tested negative for COVID-19 as Trump headed to Florida for his first campaign rally since he contracted the virus.
Trump tested negative "on consecutive days" and is "not infectious to others," according to a memo from Conley.
Trump's evening rally at an airport in Sanford, Florida, will begin a three-week sprint to Election Day as new polls show him losing more ground to Democratic rival Joe Biden in two battleground states that could decide the November 3 contest.
The president's negative COVID-19 tests were the first announced by the White House since Trump, who spent three days in a military hospital, said on October 2 that he had contracted the virus.
In a memo, Dr. Sean Conley said the tests and other clinical and laboratory data "indicate a lack of detectable viral replication."
Biden also tested negative for COVID-19 on Monday, his campaign team said in a statement. The former vice president has tested negative a number of times since Trump announced his positive test.
Trump is seeking to change the dynamics of a race that national opinion polls and some state polls show he is losing to Biden.
Biden has pulled further ahead in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, building momentum in two states that Trump carried in the 2016 presidential election, Reuters/Ipsos opinion polls showed on Monday.
The polls, conducted Tuesday through Sunday, showed Biden now leading Trump by 7 percentage points in both states.
Taking advantage of his momentum and growing advantage in the polls, Biden on Monday campaigned in Ohio, where he was once considered a long shot, as he tries to expand his reach into Republican-leaning states.
