WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump said Sunday his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani has tested positive for the coronavirus. The lawyer is the latest in Trump's inner circle to contract the disease.
The 76-year-old former New York mayor has traveled extensively to battleground states in recent days and weeks in an effort to help Trump overturn his election loss.
On numerous occasions, he has met with officials for hours at a time without wearing a mask. At some of those events, Giuliani was spotted shaking hands, hugging and taking pictures with people while not wearing a mask.
Trump, who confirmed Giuliani's positive test in a Sunday afternoon tweet, wished him a speedy recovery. “Get better soon Rudy, we will carry on!!!” Trump wrote.
Giuliani was admitted to Georgetown University Hospital on Sunday, a source familiar confirmed to CNN. A few hours after Trump shared the news, Giuliani, himself, appeared to confirm his positive diagnosis by posting on Twitter that he's "getting great care and feeling good."
There have been no additional details provided about his condition, and it is unclear when Giuliani received a positive test for COVID-19. He was most recently at the Georgia Capitol in Atlanta on Thursday to attend a Georgia state Senate hearing on the November election.
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.”
He traveled to Michigan on Wednesday for a state House committee hearing that lasted four and a half hours, during which he was maskless as he pushed misleading claims that the election was stolen from Trump.
At the beginning of the week, Giuliani was in Arizona Monday, meeting with some GOP members of the state's legislature to discuss unsubstantiated allegations that the election was fraudulent.
The Arizona Senate will be closed this week due to coronavirus concerns, Mike Philipsen, communications director for the Arizona Senate, confirmed to CNN in an email Sunday night. Members and staff will be working remotely, Philipsen said.
Giuliani has been traveling with Trump campaign attorney Jenna Ellis, who has appeared at his side at all of the events about the 2020 election in the last week.
Ellis on Sunday tweeted out "prayers for Mayor @RudyGiuliani" and called him a "tough warrior." She vowed the President's legal team would continue its efforts to overturn the election results.
Last month, Giuliani's son, Andrew, who is a White House staffer, tested positive for COVID-19 after attending a Trump campaign legal team news conference with his father in Washington, DC.
Andrew Giuliani posted on Twitter Sunday night that his father is "resting, getting great care and feeling well."
The former mayor is the latest person in the President's orbit to contract the virus. The president, first lady Melania Trump, his sons Donald Jr. and Barron, his chief of staff Mark Meadows and a number of other top aides both in his campaign and in the White House have tested positive in recent months.
Giuliani was also in close proximity with Bill White, a Trump booster in Georgia who attended the president's rally Saturday night in Valdosta. White shook hands and closely embraced Giuliani last week.
As the number of COVID-19 cases and deaths have been on the rise, the White House has continued to flout CDC recommendations and host large events without masks and little social distancing.
Georgia Democratic state senator Elena Parent, who attended the hearing at the Georgia Capitol on Thursday with Giuliani, told CNN that Giuliani and his team "willingly endangered all of us to pander to Trump."
"It was reckless and irresponsible for the Georgia Senate Republicans to hold an in-person hearing without requiring masks and social distancing during a pandemic. Clearly the COVID risk from (Giuliani) and team, who have been attending hearings maskless all around the country, was high and they willingly endangered all of us to pander to Trump," Parent said in a statement emailed to CNN Sunday. — Agencies