WASHINGTON — Jenna Ellis, a lawyer who has been leading the Trump campaign's legal efforts to dispute the results of the 2020 presidential election, has contracted the coronavirus, a source familiar with the situation confirmed to CNN.
The source said White House aides have been informed that she has contracted the virus, but that Ellis has not been forthright with White House officials about it.
Axios first reported that Ellis had tested positive. Ellis attended a Christmas party designated for senior staff on Friday, a senior official told CNN. She regularly does not wear a mask when she is at the White House.
Ellis adds to the growing list of individuals in President Donald Trump's orbit testing positive for coronavirus in recent months. Most recently, Rudy Giuliani, another Trump lawyer working on baseless efforts to challenge the election results, was admitted to the hospital this weekend after testing positive for COVID-19.
Giuliani and Ellis have frequently appeared maskless while crisscrossing the country in recent weeks to advance Trump's baseless election fraud claims.
The new case from someone close to the President comes amid a record number of hospitalizations of COVID-19 patients and a surge in deaths in the US. Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner were guests at the same White House holiday party on Friday that Ellis attended, a White House official said.
Trump's surgeon general, Dr. Jerome Adams, previously warned against all Americans — even those at the White House — from participating in large holiday gatherings because they might become coronavirus superspreader events.
But during one holiday party at the White House in recent weeks, despite officials saying there would be safety protocols, publicly accessible social media images posted by attendees indicated that there was little social distancing and many guests were not wearing masks.
Meanwhile, on learning Sunday that Rudy Giuliani tested positive for COVID-19, Georgia senators who attended a seven-hour hearing last week with President Donald Trump’s personal attorney were urged to self-quarantine.
Senate President Pro Tem Butch Miller, a Gainesville Republican who did not attend the hearing, said senators who participated in the Senate Judiciary subcommittee meeting who have not previously contracted COVID-19 were encouraged to quarantine for two weeks. Giuliani, a former mayor of New York City, did not wear a mask while in the Capitol.
“We are clearly disappointed that Mayor Giuliani disregarded the health and well-being of others by not wearing a mask when it clearly would have been appropriate,” Miller said.
State Sen. William Ligon, a Brunswick Republican and chairman of the subcommittee that held the hearing, said in a statement that Giuliani was in “close proximity to senators, Senate staff, members of the media and the general public,” and he encouraged them to follow health recommendations.
Giuliani participated in similar hearings in Arizona and Michigan. Arizona legislative officials announced Sunday that the Legislature would close for a week “out of an abundance of caution,” according to The Arizona Republic.
Senate staff members who came in contact with Giuliani have been asked to get COVID-19 tests and work remotely until they receive negative test results, said Steve Tippins, Miller’s chief of staff. — Agencies
